Democracy Bytes: New Media, New Politics and Generational Change

This book is about new media, young people, the crisis of democracy and political renewal. It addresses a mixture of traditional and new questions: What is the political and political legitimacy? How do we understand politics in a 'network age'? Can we talk sensibly about the concept of a generation and generational change? Does democracy have a future? This book offers an optimistic assessment of how digital media supports new and distinctive forms of politics. Four case studies are offered: one inquires into performance art and protest in Russia, another investigates new media campaigns to defend the rights to freedom of speech and copyright in America, another inquires into indigenous art and cartoons as politics in outback Australia and the last explores new forms of student action in schools and at the modern university.

Table of Contents:
1. Introduction 2. Politics In the Age of the Digital 3. How The Light Gets In: Change and Continuity 4. Change and Generation 5. Coming of Age in a Digital Neo-liberal World: Generation and Politics 6. A Heuristic or Guiding Framework PART II: CASE STUDIES: IDENTIFYING POLITICAL CHANGE AND GENERATIONS 7. Democratic Renewal, Pussy Riot and Flash Gigs in the Kremlin 8. The Graduate's Future and Neoliberal Education: New Generation Politics on the Campus 9. The Stop Online Piracy Act Case 10. The Digital, Indigenous Art and Politics 11. Conclusion

About the Author :
Judith Bessant is Professor at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology University, Australia.

Review :
'In Democracy Bytes, Judith Bessant raises profound questions about the public realm, generations, neoliberal power, and the Internet. With fascinating case studies ranging from Russia's Pussy Riot, to universities, to US debates about piracy laws, to Australian indigenous art and activism, she explores how young online activists participate in struggles against power-holders, and begin to change the meaning of politics. This is a book for everyone who is interested in democracy in a changing world' - Raewyn Connell, University of Sydney, Australia 'With great analytic skill, vivid examples, and a very engaging and accessible style, Judith Bessant takes on the key questions about democracy and the transformation of politics. She illuminates the complex relationships between digital media and young people, probing change and continuity across generations. Engaging in a critical and elegant manner with a range of theoretical trajectories, she develops her own framework that she applies to several compelling case studies. The result is a outstanding book that cannot be bypassed by anyone concerned about these questions'. - Peter Dalhgren, Lund University, Sweden 'Judith Bessant has provided an insightful analysis of what political struggle, if not politics itself, might look like for young people in the digital age. Youth inhabit a digital space that is both destructive and emancipatory, but we often only hear one side of this narrative. Not so with this beautifully written carefully crafted combination of theory and field work. A wonderful book that takes the merging of culture, politics, and subjectivity seriously and should be read by everyone concerned about a world that is been turned upside down by the digital revolution'. - Henry Giroux, McMaster University, Ontario, Canada