Systemic-Communicative Dimensions of Modern Protest (based on German-Language Online Petitions)

Abstract

The results of a study of the characteristics of German-speaking online petitions on the openPetition platform, constituting a spatio-temporal, substantive, collective-personal systemic-communicative dimension of protest; studying the current manifestations of the mediation of politics and Net-thinking as an attribute of modern mediation in the studied communicative practices of protest are presented in the article. The integrative nature of electronic petitions is revealed, which is determined by their multifunctionality, discursive hybridity and stylistic syncretism. The design features in online petitions of a complex addressee (individual addressee and collective co-addressee) and complex addressee (mass and target addressee); relevant communication strategies and tactics of the mass addressee, individual addressee and co-addressees are described. The regularities of the agenda and discursive construction of the problem in online petitions are determined. The methods of forming and maintaining Internet solidarity in the studied protest practice are described. The manifestations of mediation of politics and personality in the analyzed practices are revealed. Attributes and actual reflection in online petitions of a new type of thinking (Net-thinking) as a consequence of the specifics of modern mediation of protest communication are described. The results of the study make a certain contribution to further understanding of the relationship between technological and sociocultural changes.

Online petitions as actual protest practice in Russia and Germany: general and linguistic socio-cultural specific system-communicative characteristics

“…The studied protest practices of the two linguistic cultures reveal features of both strategies: a rigid conflict resolution strategy and strategies of mutual compromises and protracted negotiations [Rebrina, Shamne, 2020a, Rebrina, Shamne, Eltanskaya, 2020b. Analysis of online petitions in Germany and Russia indicates deviations from the larger (3/4) part of the postulates of successful conflict management by R. Fischer and W. Ury.…”

“…The study of collective and personal system-communicative dimension of online petitions in Germany and Russia shows that in both cases the motivating prerequisite for addressers is their individual interest and competence in any field, since almost all addressers of German-and Russian-language petitions are the initiators of a single petition on the platforms under consideration; a feature of these protest practices in the framework of the described measurement is a complex target (a result of twovector addressing -to the users of the petition platform, with the aim of problematisation, solidarity, mobilization; to the authority as a target destination with the aim of beliefs and motivations) and integrated addresser (the author of the initiative and signers as a collective co-adresser) [Rebrina, Shamne, 2020a;Rebrina, Shamne, Eltanskaya, 2020b]; the emphasis of one of the abovementioned vectors determines dominating features of journalistic or business texts and the types of arguments used. At the same time, the addressee and the addresser receive different explication in the studied texts of petitions of two linguistic cultures.…”

“…The metaconcept «mediatization» allows us to understand the mutually dependent transformations of the technological and socio-cultural. The manifestations of mediatization in the studied practices of the two countries include [Rebrina, Shamne, 2020a, Rebrina, Shamne, Eltanskaya, 2020b]: 1) simplifying reduction of the reality constructed and presented to the mass addressee (frequency of psychological arguments, non-necessity of factual substantiation of emotional arguments, removal from the communicative focus of the shortcomings of the proposed solutions, the position and arguments of the opponent, strengthening of emotional commitment); 2) expanding the implosion of the social [Baudrillard, 2015] (diffuse status of the addressee and addressee, subject and object of influence, virtualization of solidarity, network structure of the community as a new form of socialality, combination of public and private, public subjectivity, expanding production of Internet content as «Self-resource» of the individual and a component of the author's identity, technical determinism of these processes); 3) multiplication and complication of the subject of protest communication as a reflection of the socio-psychological reasons for the mediatization of society and the individual (freedom to produce a public product as a reflection of the need to be heard and the desire to expand the «Self-resources», the implementation of the role of the addresser without the presence of media experience and/or competencies; a complex category of addresser and addressee); 4) mediatorial personalized presentation and «soft» conflict resolution (petitions as a «soft» version of legal practices and mediation function of petition platforms; individualization of suggestions and recommendations at the platform, the possibility of individual «management» of the user's personal activity); 5) transgressivity as an attribute of communicants' communicative behavior and the final product of solidarity caused by the growing pace of life and mediatization, which is reflected in the information structure, composition, language and stylistic means of texts and is focused on maximizing the purposeful «power of the text», «communicative will» of the addresser) [Lundby, 2014;Rebrina, Shamne, 2020a;Rebrina, Shamne, Eltanskaya, 2020b;Stepanov, 2016] (for example, the presence of «nontext» structural elements with a transgressive potential, i.e. images, including interactive maps, and videos as a means of visualization and complementation of perception modes; hashtags and hyperlinks as a means of optimizing the mobilization of supporters, semantic expansion and deepening, individualization of information; the modular nature of the text as a means of structuring speech and message, visualization of its information structure).…”

“…Today's communication practices of protest illustrate not only new opportunities but also new «disadvantages» and problems associated with the globalization of the media, modern information and communication technologies and electronic democracy as an actual form of communication between citizens and authorities ; transformations of retial social mass communication, communicative experience and the subject of communication itself, mediatization of public life and the individual, new forms of collective interaction [Rebrina, Shamne, 2020a]. Online petitions are a mobilisation practice implementing direct democracy, conventional political involvement of citizens characterized as participation (different levels of participation from «clicktivism» to initiation of protest actions [Berg, 2017]), constructive and active protest (participants of which differ in heterogeneity of behavior and motivation (activism consumers, new lobbyists, hit activists, stakeholdersneue Lobbyisten, hit and run-Aktivisten, Activism Consumers und Single Issue Stakeholders [Jungherr, Jürgens, 2011]) [Rebrina, Shamne, 2020a ;Rebrina, Shamne, Eltanskaya, 2020b].…”

The Social Nature Of International Legal Cooperation

“…So, the three-dimensional spatial model of relations taking place in the sphere of international legal cooperation is due to the multidimensional and complex nature of such legal relations, which covered not only various branches of national law (private and public) and the rights of foreign partner countries, but also international law (Rebrina & Shamne, 2020).…”