This is true to a certain extent --- Social media give leverage to networks of international NGO’s, for instance, and bring their constituencies in various countries closer together. This in turn may invigorate them and enhance their potential to weigh in on national policies in various countries. This phenomenon is clearly observable in the field of climate change. However, the novelty of transnational mass communication may not be exaggerated. The socialist international, for instance, is a more than century-old movement that derives part of its force from cross-border solidarity and collaboration between the masses, which is partly a reality, but also partly a construct. The Asia Europe People’s Forum is also an interesting experiment in this perspective. What I mean to say is that cross- border mass communication is not always authentic, but (partly) steered by traditional actors.

Source author: Koenraad Du Pont koenraad.dupont@diplobel.fed.be