title: The dynamics of protest recruitment through an online network.
abstract: The recent wave of mobilizations in the Arab world and across Western countries has generated much discussion on how digital media is connected to the diffusion of protests. We examine that connection using data from the surge of mobilizations that took place in Spain in May 2011. We study recruitment patterns in the Twitter network and find evidence of social influence and complex contagion. We identify the network position of early participants (i.e. the leaders of the recruitment process) and of the users who acted as seeds of message cascades (i.e. the spreaders of information). We find that early participants cannot be characterized by a typical topological position but spreaders tend to be more central in the network. These findings shed light on the connection between online networks, social contagion, and collective dynamics, and offer an empirical test to the recruitment mechanisms theorized in formal models of collective action.
authors.affiliation: Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, 1 St. Giles OX1 3JS, Oxford, UK. sandra.gonzalezbailon@oii.ox.ac.uk
authors.forename: Sandra
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: González-Bailón
authors.forename: Javier
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Borge-Holthoefer
authors.forename: Alejandro
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Rivero
authors.forename: Yamir
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Moreno
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D033181:Information Dissemination / Q000379:methods*; D020407:Internet; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D011057:Politics; D060756:Social Networking; D013997:Time Factors