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Media, Culture & Society

DOI: 10.1177/0163443709102714 2009; 31; 409 Media Culture Society

Dimitra L. Milioni Probing the online counterpublic sphere: the case of Indymedia Athens

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Probing the online counterpublic sphere: the caseof Indymedia Athens

Dimitra L. MilioniCYPRUS UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY

Revisiting Jürgen Habermas

Although more than 40 years have gone by since Jürgen Habermas originallynarrated the birth and the decline of the bourgeois public sphere (Habermas,1989/1962), this ideal still holds a strong grip on our attempts to either criti-cally examine or re-invent the idea of modern democracy. Since the mid-1990s the work of Jürgen Habermas has become once again relevant, thistime regarding the political impact of new information and communicationtechnologies, and in particular the internet. Acknowledging the legitimationand steering crisis of the modern democratic state and the corrosion of thecritical role of the current mass media system, many scholars turned to thenew medium attempting to re-invent, on a normative as well as on an empir-ical basis, a politically functioning public sphere (Connery, 1997; Dahlberg,2001; Knapp, 1997; Poster, 1997).

Interestingly, the public sphere perspective for approaching the internet runscounter to Habermas’ interpretation of this association. Recently, Habermasfirmly rejected the view that liberal democracies can benefit from the delibera-tive activity of internet users in the countless chat rooms and online fora. Instead,he regards the fragmented and isolated issue publics as a danger to the politicalprocess within established spheres (Habermas, 2006; see also Downey andFenton, 2003: 189).1 While these objections cannot be overlooked, certainwidely used social features of the internet, such as connectivity and networking,serve an integrating function and can be seen as counterbalancing the never-ending fragmentation of online space.

Advocates of the idea of the public sphere must provide convincing answersto some vexing questions; for instance, is this model still relevant for our plural-istic, multicultural and global societies? Is it relevant for our spatio-temporally

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rearranged, transnational and still very much media-dominated politics? Andhow should we redefine the democratic public sphere, when the range of its maincomponents – political power, communication and information flow, and thepublic – extends globally creating a transnational territory of global citizens?

This article argues that the normative ideal of the public sphere is still anextremely constructive and appropriate concept both as a tool for criticizingthe current power constellations (mass media included) and as a compass forrestructuring the public space towards more democratization. Three major mod-ifications must be noted: (a) the multiplicity and diversity of publics, (b) theconsideration of processes of identity formation and collective action, and (c)the terms under which deliberation is carried out. These three changes corre-spond to the main dimensions of the public sphere: the structural, the represen-tational and the interactional dimension (Dahlgren, 1995: 11–23, 2005: 148).

Multiplicity and diversity of the public sphere: dominant and counterpublics

The first modification concerns the structure of the contemporary publicsphere, which is no longer a united and homogeneous space, but a multiplic-ity of more or less public spheres in the context of a global civil society. Thisconcept acknowledges the plurality and heterogeneity of ‘publics’ and ‘pub-lic opinions’. Modern publics crystallize in highly complex, horizontal com-munication networks among strangers that are built around different texts andmedia and do not depend solely on physical co-presence. Instead, they dis-play fluid and permeable temporal, spatial and social boundaries (Habermas,1996: 307–8, 320). Moreover, the public sphere is not a purely abstract con-cept beyond the empirical realm, but is situated in the lifeworld, is inhabitedby ‘embodied actors’ who act ‘in historical time and social space’ (1996:324). Such a conceptual framework is also consistent with a less sharp dis-tinction between the public and the private sphere. Although the overlappingpartial publics are decentralized, they remain ‘porous to one another’ (1996:373), and thus ‘do not seal off the private from the public but only channel theflow of topics from the one sphere into the other’ (1996: 365–6).

The multiple-spheres approach does not go uncontested. Dean, for instance,questions the idea that ‘adding an s solves the problem of the public sphere’(2001: 248). More importantly, the multiplicity of publics does not amount tothe egalitarian social distribution of resources needed for participation andrepresentation in the public space. Systemic constraints and accidentalinequalities in the distribution of individual abilities point out the structuralasymmetries of the public sphere (Habermas, 1996: 325). This is particularlytrue for the communication space created and dominated by the mass media.Yet, the general public sphere today cannot be defined univocally by the infor-mational and symbolic content of the mass media, although they still exertstrong influence on agenda-setting as well as the conditions under which

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discussion is conducted and opinion is formed. For these reasons, the spaceoccupied by the mass media has the character of a dominant or ‘hegemonic’public sphere, which is associated with the production, circulation and repro-duction of the dominant public opinion.

Subsequently, the dominant publics are those ‘that can take their discoursepragmatics and their lifeworlds for granted, misrecognizing the indefinite scopeof their expansive address as universality or normalcy’ (Warner, 2002: 88). Thisconstitutes a substantial distinction between the ‘dominant’ and the ‘alternative’or ‘counterpublic spheres’. As Habermas notes: ‘actors who know they areinvolved in the common enterprise of reconstituting and maintaining structuresof the public sphere as they contest opinions and strive for influence differ fromactors who merely use forums that already exist’ (1996: 369–70). Counterpublicsare differentiated neither primarily by their composition (e.g. subordinate socialgroups), nor by their capacity to produce counter-discourses (though this abilityhas been crucial for long-time subaltern social groups, such as women; see Fraser,1992), nor by their potential to succeed in exerting actual influence on thepolitical system. Their distinctive character, and their crucial role, is in their trans-formative, instead of merely replicative (Warner, 2002: 88), orientation, which isa modification of existing norms and patterns, and the actualization and, poten-tially, radicalization of the normative content of the critical public sphere.

Identity formation and deliberation

Two more areas that we need to rethink are the representational and interac-tional dimensions of the public sphere. The former refers to the relationbetween the public sphere and both identity formation and collective action,and the latter is linked to the Habermasian ideal of deliberation.

In the classic conception of the public sphere, there is no room for, noracknowledgement of, a distinct role for collective identity in the democraticorganization – other than the latent identity of the autonomous individual citi-zen.As Peters notes (1993: 562), in the Habermasian model: ‘democracy is theidentity of the citizens and the government’. However, identity and politicsare indissolubly connected: ‘identity is permanently placed in a tug-of-war ofhegemony and anti-hegemony’ and ‘the politics of identity always refer toirrefutable power relations’ (Demertzis, 2002: 390, author’s translation).

Similarly, we ought to reconsider the theory that excludes collective actionfrom the public sphere and does not acknowledge the dimension of civil societyas a site of social struggle or conflict (a place to be seized) (see Breslow, 1997:246). Defenders of the ‘agonistic model of democracy’ (Mouffe, 2000) or the‘contentious pluralism’ model (Guidry and Sawyer, 2003) advocate the needfor a conceptualization of political speech, which acknowledges the ever-present conflict in societal life, including ‘struggles and contestations carried outby unequal partners under unequal conditions’ (Dean, 2001: 265) and ‘effective

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cultural intervention in public deliberation’ (Welsh, 2002: 688). Habermashimself has recently ‘added a “collective action” component to his theory of thepublic sphere’ (Kim, 1997: 10–1; see also Downey and Fenton, 2003: 186–7),acknowledging the fundamental role of associations and social movements,including the practice of civil disobedience (Habermas, 1996: 382–4). This shiftfrom deliberation to collective action, recognizing the dynamics of networkingand collaborative action among actors in the civil society, is a crucial element forany conceptualization of the modern public sphere.

Does all this mean that we can do away with the deliberative ideal fordemocracy? The strictly defined Habermasian communicative rationality andthe demanding standards of the ideal speech situation, even while remember-ing its counterfactual character, places an additional burden on the actualiza-tion of the deliberative model of democracy. The idea of universal deliberationamong equals obscures the power asymmetries resulting from the diffusesocio-economic inequalities, which act against the less powerful segments ofsociety and their capacity to articulate their problems lucidly, efficiently andwith convincing reasons, in public deliberation (see Hicks, 2002).Furthermore, the rationalist bias (Dahlgren, 2005: 156), that is, the valoriza-tion of deliberation over other, non-discursive forms of expression, can serveas a mechanism of exclusion of minority voices and their public vocabularies(Young, 2000: 36–77, cited in Hicks, 2002: 235–6).As has been demonstrated,the top-down approach to deliberation, forcing participants to adopt alienforms of speech, can have serious anti-democratic effects (Hicks, 2002: 236).2

We are convinced that we cannot turn away from a deliberative, albeit weak(Hohendahl, 1992: 107) and procedural (Benhabib, 1992: 37, 74–5) notion ofdemocracy. This entails a public speech, which does not necessarily, or at anygiven time, aim at consensus, but assumes a rational-critical character andemploys reliance on the force of the best argument for reaching understand-ing. There is a growing literature addressing the issue of reformulating thedeliberative ideal. Hauser and Benoit-Barne (2002: 264–6) call for a ‘movefrom a procedural model to an equality model and from a philosophical rea-soning model to a practical reasoning model of deliberation’, which wouldacknowledge the vernacular rhetoric uttered in everyday social settings(Welsh, 2002: 698). Deliberative democracy is thought of as being decentredand extended to informal spheres of civil society and transnational publics(Bohman, 2004) or as a contestation among discourses across the publicsphere (Dryzek, 2001). In any case, public speech should retain its transfor-mative potential, that is, its potential for ‘remaking social conventions and re-imagining norms of communicative action’ (Hicks, 2002: 236).

The online counterpublic sphere: the case of Indymedia

The internet is already seen as the new public sphere, leading, potentially, toa new era for democracy. At the same time, the impact of the new medium, or

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rather a social space as broad as society itself, has been discussed in distinctstrands of research, either as a public sphere or as a space for communitybuilding, or, instrumentally, as a tool for facilitating collective action. Moreoften than not, these facets are portrayed as dissociated phenomena.

Our research hypothesis was that the transformative potential of the inter-net resides in weaving together the different aspects of the democratic publiclife, such as information acquisition and opinion formation, political discus-sion, identity building and collective action. By facilitating the constructionof active publics it suggests a changed notion of the public sphere.

To test our assumptions, we looked into the alternative sphere, siding withresearchers who place their hopes for the invigoration of democracy on theinformal, extra-parliamentary realm of political activity and the enormousboost it seems to gain by internet use (Carroll and Hackett, 2006; Dahlgren,2005; Dean, 2001; Dryzek, 2001; Guidry and Sawyer, 2003). Despite thisrenewed interest, a significant gap exists in the knowledge regarding the alter-native media, as to the norms, processes and discourses that are developed,the activists who sustain them, the publics who use them, the reach of theirproducts within the general public, and the reception and interpretation oftheir content. As Downing puts it: ‘it is a paradox … that so little attention hasbeen dedicated to the user dimension, given that alternative-media activistsrepresent in a sense the most active segment of the so-called “active audi-ence”’ (Downing, 2003: 625; see also Atton and Couldry, 2003: 579; Downeyand Fenton, 2003: 185–6). Fortunately, this gap seems to be closing as anincreasing number of studies are appearing in this field,3 which, we surmise,is not unrelated to the fact that the internet, by increasing the publicness andavailability of many until-now invisible projects, offers a huge opportunity forresearch in this field.

The field of this study is a much quoted example4 of online alternativemedia, the Network of Independent Media Centers (NIMC), which is closelyassociated with the activity of the alternative globalization movement—a sortof digital CNN for the new global citizen movement. This case study focusesin local settings, the Greek IMC Athens (Figure 1), and employs a publicsphere perspective, which consists of the three analytic dimensions men-tioned earlier.

First, to look into the structural aspect, we explored the organizational andnormative features of the global IMC network, with particular emphasis onthe connection of ‘local’ IMCs to the ‘global’ network structure. Second, therepresentational dimension was explored by focusing on everyday use ofthe website by its users. News and comments posted on the IMC Athens web-site for a 10-day period provided the basis for a qualitative analysis, whichexamined the content, sourcing and framing of news postings and the patternsof information processing, compared to the respective mainstream mediapractices (for similar online fora surveys see Hill and Hughes, 1997, 1998;Rafaeli and Sudweeks, 1997; Schultz, 2000). Third, the study explored theinteractional dimension by exploring users’ behaviour and communication

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practices with particular interest in the terms under which they engaged indiscussion with each other.

The main research questions follow:

Does the NIMC constitute a new or alternative model of journalism, andhow is it differentiated from the dominant mass media model? How are theconcept and the role of the public shaped within this environment?

Is there a rational-critical, dialogical structure in the forum of NIMC?

Do users form a collective identity, and what does it consist in?

How do the ‘local’ and the ‘global’ intertwine in the structure of NIMC?

How is the network related to collective action within the framework ofsocial movements?

Research methodology

To provide answers to these questions, we carried out a content analysis of asample of publicly available communication data on the IMC Athens website.A short account of sampling, coding and reliability practices follows.

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FIGURE 1Homepage of IMC Athens

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To explore the general Indymedia scheme, we gathered and studied variousinformation from the Indymedia Documentation Project and the archives ofthe global discussion lists. To analyse the specific structural and functionalfeatures of the network (e.g. features, calendar, etc.), data were gathered fromthe IMC Athens website for an approximately five-year operation period(October 2001–April 2005).

The main data came from observation and recording of all postings pub-lished in IMC Athens website for 10 days (1–10 November 2002). Thisperiod, which coincided with the organization of the first European SocialForum in Florence and the few days that preceded it, was purposely chosento explore users’ communicative activity and the possible role of the localIMC during those events. Similar events take place regularly and their cov-erage is considered a central task for the network; however, since themethod of purposive sampling was preferred over random sampling, and toensure reliability of measurements, a set of additional indicators were com-puted for different time periods. From the comparison of both the selected10-day period and the whole month of November 2002 to different timeintervals from July 2002 to July 2003, no differences were observed withregard to the average hits on webpages and articles or to the technical char-acteristics of users (browser, operational system). Therefore, it is presumedthat purposive sampling did not distort the findings in a significant extent(Milioni, 2006: Appendix C).

The posting serves as the unit of analysis. After filtering the ‘hidden articles/comments’ and merging specific categories of comments, the final sample num-bered 1703 postings (232 articles and 1471 comments). SPSS was used forstatistical analysis.

Variables: posting function and user roleTo explore the postings’ function in IMC, three values were defined: infor-mation, communication and action (Table 1a). Postings of news stories oradditional news information were coded as informative. Communicative post-ings included views, in-depth analysis, comments, questions, replies, etc. Thepostings coded as referring to action were those that proposed or urged usersto act or those that contained important information on organization and coor-dination of future activities. In cases where a posting fulfilled more than onefunction (e.g. information about a campaign and urge to participate in anaction), the posting was coded according to the function that was deemedprevalent, in terms of extent and emphasis. Based on this categorization, twofunctional subcategories of the network were computed: the informationalpart and the communicative or discursive part.

The second variable focused on the roles assumed by users of IMC(Table 1a). Although the open publishing model promotes a ‘close and non-hierarchical relationship between reader and content’ (Platon and Deuze,

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2003: 350), or even the complete fusion of reader and writer, users of IMCcan assume various roles. The journalist/editor or ‘fact-checker’ (Gill, 2004)role refers to seeking, cross-checking, editing, framing and reframing newsstories, as well as posting or further diffusing information. The grassrootsreporter reports directly his or her own experiences or first-hand information.The commentator role, or ‘author’ (Slevin, 2000: 140), consists in comment-ing, expressing opinion, criticizing or participating in discussions about newsor issues published in IMC. Finally, the moderator monitors and managesdiscussions in the forum.

Variables: communicative activity and behaviourIn assessing users’ communicative activity in the IMC Athens forum, weused the concept of interactivity as the third variable, defined by Rafaeli andSudweeks (1997: n.p.) as ‘the extent to which messages in a sequence relateto each other, and especially the extent to which later messages recount therelatedness of earlier messages’ (see also Rafaeli, 1988). Although thisconstruct has not been used much in computer-mediated communication(CMC) analysis (see Walther et al., 2005: 642), we find this concept veryuseful for the kind of analysis pursued in this project. The focus on theexchange and interplay of messages, rather than on the general characteris-tics of the media, for jointly produced meaning and merging of speakingwith listening (Rafaeli and Sudweeks, 1997), incorporates the interchange-able roles of source and receiver and their reciprocal influence (Waltheret al., 2005: 640).

Although Rafaeli and Sudweeks (1997) interpret interactivity as a sociallybinding force, in this study we regard it as an indication, or as an external char-acteristic, of the rational-dialogic form of communication exchange. Inter-activity is linked to the comprehensibility of communicative contexts, but also,on another level, to the expression and exchange of rational arguments (cf.Dahlberg, 2001). Furthermore, to the extent that it requires interlocutors toread the whole thread carefully and follow the conversation, it can also serve

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TABLE 1aPosting function and user role

Variable Values

Posting function informationcommunicationaction

User role journalist/editorgrassroots reporterauthor/commentatormoderator

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as an a indication of reflexivity and ideal role-taking, which, as largely inter-nal processes that change over long periods of time, are difficult to detect andmeasure. Consequently, messages were coded as reactive (when interlocutorsreferred to previous messages), fully interactive (when later messages tookinto account the manner in which previous messages were reactive) and non-interactive (Table 1b).

The fourth variable, argumentation, was not assessed in terms of the validity,persuasiveness or rationality of arguments (considering such an objectificationhighly contestable); instead, the number and length of arguments were measuredin relation to the expressed positions, using three scale categories (Table 1b)to evaluate the extent to which users chose to justify their claims with rationalarguments.

The fifth variable, polarity, measures the degree of agreement or disagree-ment expressed by users of the IMC forum, using the six scale values pre-sented in Table 1b. Again, it is used as an indication to ascertain whether userstend to reinforce each others’ strongly held assumptions or evaluate criticallytheir claims (cf. Hill and Hughes, 1998: 74).

In a specific discussion thread, polarity does not characterize the overalldegree of agreement of disagreement, as users can agree or disagree with dif-ferent views. For example, even if in a 10-posting thread 9 out of 10 postingsexpress agreement, it does not mean that all users agree with each other; itmeans that 9 out of 10 users chose to point out their concurrence with a spe-cific position, rather than their difference. In the following excerpts from a

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TABLE 1bFeatures of communicative activity and behaviour

Variable Values

Interactivity reactiveinteractivenon-interactive

Argumentation no argumentsweak argumentationstrong argumentation

Polarity mainly strong disagreementmainly temperate disagreementboth disagreement and agreement to different viewsneutralitymainly temperate agreementmainly strong agreement

Attitude friendlytemperatetense (sharp criticism towards ideas)competitive (sharp criticism towards persons)hostile (ad hominem insults, obscenity, profanity)

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thread about the proposed incorporation of an electronic dictionary in theIMC forum so users could improve their language, the first posting expressesmainly strong disagreement, the second both agreement and disagreementwith different views, the third is mainly a strong agreement, and the fourth ismainly temperate agreement.

(1) J. says: Dear Mary, with all the respect, I disagree with you. The phrase‘Bush is a terrorist’ conveys the same truth, in whatever languageit is written and however misspelled …

(2) E. says: Mary, I agree with J. The meaning is not affected by how correctlyone spells one’s words.… On the other hand, J., in IMC [Athens]we never stay in the subject. We all do that …

(3) G. says: Mary is absolutely right! We are the language we speak. Becauseno one is perfect, a dictionary would be useful for those, likemyself, who want to improve their language …

(4) K. says: Mary is absolutely right. Defenders of globalization vindicate aflattening homogenization.… Of course, language is not in dangerby wrong spelling or the use of English words. In this point, Maryis exaggerating …

Finally, attitudinal dimensions of online communication have received muchattention in CMC literature, often with emphasis upon ‘flaming’, that is,‘personal, ad hominem attacks that focus on the person and not the ideas …usually accompanied by profanity’ (Hill and Hughes, 1997: 10), and its fre-quently disastrous effects on online communities (Connery, 1997; Dutton,1996; Hill and Hughes, 1998; Millard, 1997). The sixth variable, attitude,is intended to record the way users choose to position themselves towardsothers, whether they are being friendly, temperate, competitive, hostile, etc.(Table 1b). Some excerpts from the same thread may illustrate the differencesamong these values. The first posting is coded as tense, the second as com-petitive and the third as hostile.

(1) B. says: What are you talking about? These ideas … are very dangerousand they reveal xenophobic and nationalist tendencies. Get overthat, or you don’t belong here …

(2) L. says: … [What you said] is a burst of helpless rage of a provincialteacher of the 1950s against his crappy pupils, who do not complywith his commands …

(3) T. says: Some a–––s here need psychotherapy.… What is dangerous is thatcretins, like you, think that they can have an opinion …

Findings and discussion

Indymedia as media organization

When the Independent Media Centers Network as a media organization iscompared to the mainstream journalistic model, three functional areas are

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revealed. The first is the exemplary function, which is shaped by the net-work’s structural, normative and ethical characteristics and their direct oppo-sition to the dominant model of mainstream media. The traits of the newmodel consist of: (1) preserving an explicitly political character, opposed tothe mass media’s tendency to infotainment; (2) safeguarding its autonomyfrom state control and formal political institutions, as well as from the com-mercialization logic of market economy; (3) grounding its operation in termsof non-hierarchical, non-professional and collective handling of information;(4) promoting diversity of sources and inviting subjective and passionatedescriptions of social reality, contrary to the norm of ‘objectivity’ prevalent inmainstream media; and (5) depending on the active and vigorous participa-tion of its publics in every stage of the news editing process.

Second, the IMC network takes on a competitive function towards the main-stream media. This refers to the building of an autonomous channel of unmedi-ated communication with the lifeworld that creates an outlet in the electronicpublic sphere for the issues that are being under-represented in the dominantpublic sphere. As we can see in Table 2, users employ a variety of sources,besides mainstream media, to build up the informative part of IMC. Primaryindividual sources, in particular, amount to 20.54 percent. The respective rolemainly assumed by users is that of the grassroots reporter. The competitive func-tion aims clearly at ‘agenda-setting’, that is, ‘the process of identifying and advo-cating social problems for inclusion on public and governmental agendas … bybringing new or greater attention to a particular problem’ (Smith et al., 2001:1400). Through this process, network users attain the maximum degree of ‘self-determination’ regarding the handling of information, bypassing the media andcontrolling the terms of their own representation in the public space.

Even with the broad use of other sources, the mainstream media are exten-sively used (31.62 percent) as information suppliers for IMC users. This find-ing supports the point that ‘the public spheres created by the internet and the

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TABLE 2News sources in the informative part of IMC

News sources Frequency Percentage Cumulative percentage

Mainstream media 117 31.62 31.62Primary individual sources 76 20.54 52.16IMCs 48 12.97 65.14Unknown 37 10.00 75.14Associations/groups 37 10.00 85.14Online networks 35 9.46 94.59(other than IMCs)Other media 11 2.97 97.57Scientific sources 6 1.62 99.19Other online sources 3 0.81 100.00Total 370 100.00

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web are more than just parallel information universes that exist independentlyof the traditional mass media’ (Bennett, 2003: 161). The media news storiespublished in the IMC website are often supplemented with additional infor-mation from various sources, personal comments, views and critical observa-tions. This practice indicates a supplementary function of IMC in relation tomainstream media, which allows users to reframe news stories and check onthe authenticity and objectivity of the media, thus limiting their power over theconstruction of social reality. They aim at ‘agenda building’, to influence theinterpretation and prioritizing of problems, that is, not just to influence whatpeople think about, but to shape how people think about social problems andtheir solutions (Smith et al., 2001: 1400).

Moreover, the discussion that ensues about the meaning and the interpreta-tion of news encourages critical reflection on the part of the public towards theviews reported in the mainstream media. Table 3 shows that IMC users’ atti-tudes towards mainstream media are, to a great extent (82.61 percent), wary,ranging from a scornful side-reference to the critical examination of media. Inshort, through these three functions, the notion of the public is being trans-formed. In this model the public is undertaking the vigilant monitoring andsupervision of the media, becoming itself the watchdog of the watchdogs.

Indymedia as a sphere of communication and critical-rational discussion

The examination of Indymedia as a discursive space had a two-fold aim: first,to explore the nature and the specific characteristics of the communicationtaking place among users in the IMC forum, and to ascertain whether itresembles the model of rational-critical discussion, which is at the heart of theHabermasian concept of communicative rationality. The second aim was toexamine the shaping of social relations among users, specifically, the forma-tion of collective identities.

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TABLE 3Users’ attitude towards mainstream media

Users’ attitude towards Frequency Percentage Cumulativemainstream media percentage

Scornful side-reference 81 29.35 29.35Reference as direct 79 28.62 57.97or indirect sourceCritical examination of media 68 24.64 82.61Mere reference 34 12.32 94.93Reference to the institutional 14 5.07 100.00dimension of mediaTotal 276 100.00

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The first finding is that, despite its normative emphasis on its role as analternative media outlet, the major part of users’ activity is devoted to discus-sion and exchange of views about news and timely issues (Tables 4 and 5,78.9 percent and 80.6 percent respectively). Online discussion is character-ized by a comparatively high degree of interactive (18.4 percent) and reactive(75.5 percent) communication (data not shown) (cf. Rafaeli and Sudweeks,1997). Also, interactivity is correlated to argumentation (Table 6).

Regarding the critical-rational dimension of communication in IMCAthens, its strongest advantages are the firm political orientation of discus-sions, which is also clearly laid down in editorial policy and is safeguardedby moderation practices, and the high degree of argumentation. As presentedin Table 7, almost 60 percent of discursive postings contain numerous andlengthy arguments. On the other hand, users show little respect towards theviews of others or reflection on them. Whereas many postings communicatea temperate posture, almost half of the postings expressed some kind of atti-tude of manifest antagonism or hostility (Table 8). Also, discussions in IMCare segmented and quite polarized: 67.4 percent of the postings declaremainly strong disagreement with another view, and 11.3 percent tend tomainly strongly agree with another view (Table 9). Taken together, these atti-tudes amount to nearly 80 percent of the examined postings. Again, attitudeand argumentation are correlated: as argumentation gets stronger, hostility

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TABLE 4User role

User role Frequency Percentage Cumulative percentage

Author/commentator 1345 78.98 78.98Journalist/editor 205 12.04 91.02Grassroots reporter 119 6.99 98.00Moderator 34 2.00 100.00Total 1703 100.00

TABLE 5Posting intention

Posting intention Frequency Percentage Cumulative percentage

Communication 1372 80.56 80.56Information 291 17.09 97.65Action 40 2.35 100.00Total 1703 100.00

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and competitiveness increase, and friendly and temperate attitudes decrease(Table 10 and Figure 2).

These shortcomings stem mostly from Indymedia’s freedom ‘that floatsfree of any explicitly ideological basis’ (Atton, 2003: 269) and allows accesseven to viewpoints entirely oppositional to its core values (such as racist andhomophobic positions). However, contrary to Atton’s conviction that the‘focus on promoting access to the dissemination of content per se’, rather thanon a ‘specific, already existing community’ (2003: 270) causes Indymedia’sproblems, our assumption is that it is precisely this persistence with free

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TABLE 6Interactivity–argumentation crosstabulation

Argumentation

No Weak StrongInteractivity arguments argumentation argumentation Total

Yes 8 51 144 203No 130 178 376 684N/A 22 28 89 139Total 160 257 609 1026

Pearson Chi-Square 31.696, df = 4, p < 0.001

Comparisons of column proportionsa

Argumentation

No Weak Strongarguments argumentation argumentation

Interactivity (A) (B) (C)

Yes A ANo B C

Results are based on two-sided tests with significance level 0.05. For each significant pair, the key of the category withthe smaller column proportion appears under the category with the larger column proportion.a Tests are adjusted for all pairwise comparisons within a row of each innermost subtable using the Bonferroni cor-rection.

TABLE 7Argumentation

Argumentation Frequency Percentage Cumulative percentage

Strong argumentation 609 59.36 59.36Weak argumentation 257 25.05 84.41No arguments 160 15.59 100.00Total 1026 100.00

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speech, regardless of the ideology of a specific community, that affordsIndymedia its transformative power. In addition, the high levels of interactiv-ity and argumentation suggest that there exists a settled rational-critical ori-entation of discussions in IMC.

Even more important is that participants are engaging in a constant intersub-jective process of defining the debated issues and negotiating communicationand discourse ethics. What is important and what is not, what counts as politi-cal and what does not, which issue is public and which is private, what is or isnot allowed in discussion, where freedom of speech ends and justified censor-ship begins: in short, the question of the meaning and the nature of politicalspeech recurrently arises in the IMC forum. Moreover, through the critical eval-uation of information and the comments upon expressed views, users assumethe role of critical commentator, in their effort to make sense of facts and views.

Additionally, interactive communication in online fora seems to create fer-tile soil for the formation of collective identities among inhabitants of thiselectronic space. Disagreement and hostility among users diminish, and ideo-logical disputes and conflicts are set aside as soon as the issues that lie at theheart of the self-conception of the community come into play, stimulating theusers’ sense of belonging to an alternative public. These tendencies are mostlymanifested in the reports from the European Social Forum and the related

Milioni, Probing the online counterpublic sphere 423

TABLE 8Attitude

Attitude Frequency Percentage Cumulative percentage

Friendly 33 4.42 4.42Temperate 319 42.70 47.12Tense 38 5.09 52.21Competitive 182 24.36 76.57Hostile 175 23.43 100.00Total 747 100.00

TABLE 9Polarity

Polarity Frequency Percentage Cumulativepercentage

Mainly strong disagreement 595 67.38 67.38Mainly temperate disagreement 76 8.61 75.99Both disagreement and agreement 76 8.61 84.60Neutrality 18 2.04 86.64Mainly temperate agreement 18 2.04 88.67Mainly strong agreement 100 11.33 100.00

Total 883 100.00

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protest actions; these postings are characterized by enthusiastic and lyricaldescriptions, a festive atmosphere, first-person narration, and more details ofthe reporters’ personal experiences. In these discussion threads, agreement andunanimity prevail, and commonalities become visible, while the critical dis-cussion is turned into a loud – albeit temporary – ‘hypervoice’ (Mitra, 2004:503–4) that unifies individual voices and forges a common identity. The sameprocess comes into play whenever the community faces risk or threat (e.g.from mass media, state interventions or far-right attacks): the identity of mediaactivist (‘we, the Indymedia’, in users’ exact words) is formed on the one handthrough opposition to the mainstream media and, on the other hand, throughparticipation in common terms of information processing and commitment tothe principles of counter-information and free expression.

Indymedia as a global network for collective action:think globally, act globally?

Examining the network structure of the IMC model, the study examined themode of integration of local networks into a global web and the relation

424 Media, Culture & Society 31(3)

TABLE 10Interactivity–attitude crosstabulation

Attitude

Argumentation Friendly Temperate Tense Competitive Hostile Total

Strong 28 240 22 84 56 430argumentationWeak 4 64 11 55 61 195argumentationNo arguments 0 14 5 37 53 109Total 32 318 38 176 170 734

Pearson Chi-Square = 120.339, df = 8, p < 0.001

Comparisons of column proportionsb

Attitude

Friendly Temperate Tense Competitive HostileArgumentation (A) (B) (C) (D) (E)

No arguments .(a) B BWeak argumentation BStrong argumentation D E D E E

Results are based on two-sided tests with significance level 0.05. For each significant pair, the key of thecategory with the smaller column proportion appears under the category with the larger column proportion.a This category is not used in comparisons because its column proportion is equal to zero or one.b Tests are adjusted for all pairwise comparisons within a row of each innermost subtable using the Bonferroni cor-rection.

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between the ‘local’ and the ‘global’. According to Indymedia’s organizingprinciples, the overall network is based on equality, decentralization and localautonomy. This is illustrated by the digital map of Indymedia: while all localIMCs are only one ‘click’ away from each other, they preserve their adminis-trative independence and cultural autonomy. In the case of Indymedia, theglobal network exists only so long as the local networks agree to give it thenecessary resources, while the local networks are strengthened and legit-imized by their integration into a global web (see also Pickard, 2006: 323–4).We posit the presence of a decline of the ‘systemic disjunction between thelocal and the global’ (Castells, 1997: 11) and of the ‘intercultural synthesis’(Ess, 2001: 25) of the two dimensions.

The Indymedia model does not seem to promote the ‘place-based’ (Hardtand Negri, 2000: 44) conception of collective action. In Table 11, 62 percentof the future activities explicitly reported by users in IMC Athens wereplanned to take place abroad and only 35.3 percent in Greece. Seven forth-coming activities (2.7 percent) are transnational events, scheduled to occur atthe same time in different locations. From the thematic scope of these activi-ties their global character becomes salient: 69.4 percent report transnationalconcerns, while 30.6 percent refer to domestic affairs (Table 12). The empha-sis is upon global activity regarding not only the locale in which action is tak-ing place, but also the issues of concern. IndymediaAthens does not encouragea retreat to localization either as a shelter from globalization or resistance toglobalization. On the contrary, it prompts indigenous media activists ‘to thinkglobally and act globally’ (Hardt and Negri, 2000: 207). To the extent that it

Milioni, Probing the online counterpublic sphere 425

FIGURE 2Interactivity–attitude

1.0Friendly

Temperate

Tense

Competitive

Hostile

0.8

0.6

0.4

0.2

0.0No arguments Weak

argumentationStrong

argumentation

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promotes belonging to a global network, the Indymedia model differs fromisolated ‘trenches of resistance’ (Castells, 1997: 8–9, 60–4) that foster defen-sive identities; rather, it resembles a transnational coalition that connects localidentities to global considerations and builds a global solidarity.

Conclusion

More research on online spaces needs to be done before we can generalize ourconclusions and attempt to outline the activity of users in internet counter-public spheres. In the case of Independent Media Centers, the focus of thisstudy, three central repertoires of online practice are identified: informationself-determination, interactivity and delocalized networked (inter)action.5

Information self-determination refers to the enhanced abilities that IMC usersacquire, individually or collectively, in all steps of information processing –access, collection, recording, editing, production and dissemination of politicallyrelevant information. The publics that are being formed use the online space ofIMCAthens, in relation to the dominant mass media system: (a) exemplarily, bycreating new models of open and sustainable media organizations with differentstructural, normative and functional characteristics; (b) competitively, by creat-ing their own media outlets for the production and dissemination of information,and by defining the terms of their own representation; and (c) supplementarily,by actively monitoring media content, checking on media processes and criti-cizing their logic.

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TABLE 12Activities (issues of concern)

Activities Cumulative(issues of concern) Frequency Percentage percentage

Global 179 69.38 69.38National 79 30.62 100.00Total 258 100.00

TABLE 11Activities (place)

Activities (place) Frequency Percentage Cumulative percentage

Abroad 160 62.02 62.02Domestic 91 35.27 97.29Global 7 2.71 100.00Total 258 100.00

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Interactivity refers to the unprecedented capability for horizontal communi-cation among users of new technologies, and as a structural condition of the pub-lic sphere, to a vertical two-way flow of communication between the politicalsystem and the civil society. In the example of Indymedia Athens, publics usethese discursive, open online spaces as a platform for publicly exposing theirmatters of concern, expressing their views and engaging in political conversa-tion. Even though these debates are often swarming with aggression that fails toreach consensus, participants debate argumentatively about the issues under con-sideration and define, autonomously and intersubjectively, the rules and terms oftheir own discussion.

Finally, the notion of delocalized networked (inter)action is employed todescribe the increasingly significant role of the network, as an organizationalform, for collaboration, coordination and combined action between previouslydisconnected – collective or individual – actors of civil society, in delocalizedand transnational contexts. Indymedia counterpublics use their safe onlineplaces for connecting to global networks and considerations, constructingidentities, forging solidarities and coordinating their common activities.

These repertoires of online counterpublics point in the direction wherewe can begin to rethink, optimistically but soberly, the meaning of thecontemporary public sphere. Regarding all the early internet hype and itsoverenthusiastic certainties about the coming of a whole new era of cyber-democracy, we should be cautious about speaking about a positive impactof the internet on the democratic public sphere. If true, it could amount to asignificant hope for the revival of the democratic life; but, if not true, itcould serve as one more empty shell of democratic legitimacy. In light ofthis study’s findings, we argue that the idea of the public sphere is still auseful concept to understand and structure online space – provided itacknowledges the multiplicity and diversity of active publics, the new rolesand repertoires of their online counterparts, and the need for an open modelfor political communication.

Such a model, while insisting on the central role of argumentation in pub-lic debate, and the decisive significance of the best arguments in formingopinion about competing views, is complemented by autonomous places forthe interpretation of needs, the forming and reforming of collective identities,and the forging of solidarities and the organizing of coordinated action. Inconclusion, we propose that these developments lead to a changed notion of‘audience agency’, which extends far beyond the act of interpretative resist-ance against the symbolic power of mass media content to complex and mul-tiple action roles and repertoires. As Warner says: ‘it’s difficult to imagine themodern world without the ability to attribute agency to publics, althoughdoing so is an extraordinary fiction’ (2002: 88–9). Our assumption is that,with the advent of the internet and its use by multiple and diverse publics, inthe context of the informal communication networks of civil society, thisextraordinary fiction may be actualized.

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Acknowledgements

The author is grateful to Gregory Paschalidis and George Papanikolaou for theirvaluable help and support throughout the implementation of this study. Theauthor would also like to thank Peter Dahlgren for his extremely helpful com-ments and suggestions on an earlier draft of this article.

Notes

1. The author is indebted to Andrew Feenberg for this remark.2. Reed investigated the counter-revolutionary effects of formal rules of debate in

Portuguese municipal assemblies, where the introduction of a highly standardized andformalistic model of parliamentary procedure ultimately led to the withdrawal fromand the delegitimization of public deliberation (Reed, 1990, cited in Hicks, 2002:236–7). In a similar vein, Ouellette, in her study on the Public Broadcasting Service(PBS) in the United States during the 1970s, argues that the implementation of amodel of ‘enlightened democracy’ and rational public sphere on PBS did not subvertthe hegemonic logic of dominant elites and institutions, but intended to instil an ideaof good citizenship that suited the capitalist state (Ouellette, 1999).

3. Indicative list of recent works: Atton (2002), Atton and Couldry (2003), Bennett(2003), Carroll and Hackett (2006), Downing (2001b, 2003), Guidry and Sawyer(2003), Halleck (2001), Kim and Hamilton (2006), Pickard (2006), Rodríguez (2001),Vatikiotis (2005).

4. Recently, several researchers have approached the Indymedia model from sev-eral perspectives. To name a few,Atton (2003), Beckermann (2003), Downing (2001a,2001b) and Platon and Deuze (2003) have been interested in its formation and devel-opment, as well as its structure and functions, while others have focused on analysisof local IMCs (e.g. Pavis, 2002 for Philadelphia, and Pike, 2005 for St Louis). A richcollection of research papers on NIMC, presented at OURMedia Conferences, can befound at URL (consulted February 2008): http://ourmedianetwork.org/?q=node/28.Nevertheless, as Opel and Templin (2005: n.p.) note, ‘a detailed description of theIMC structure has yet to emerge in the research literature’.

5. These dimensions are discussed in more detail elsewhere (see Milioni, 2006).

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Dimitra L. Milioni holds a PhD from the Department of Journalism and MassCommunication of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. She is a lecturerat the Department of Communication and Internet Studies, Cyprus University ofTechnology. Her research interests include new and alternative media, onlinecommunities, and the impact of the internet on democracy and social movements.Address: Department of Communication and Internet Studies, Cyprus Universityof Technology, CY-3603, Limassol, Cyprus. [email: Dimitra.Milioni@cut.ac.cy]

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