9/4/02 Summary of discussion on the question:

Identify the different kinds of activities that political groups engage in and how they use the Internet to facilitate those activities? Also, does the Internet limit or constraint those activities in any way?

Activities	Internet facilitation	Internet limitation
Teach about organization	Distribution of teaching information	Potential for misinformation or incorrect information
Teach about issues/policies/elections/goals
Organizing/planning (offline)	Promotes awareness of organizing events	Unknown if target audience will receive or read the message.
Organizing/planning (online) e.g., bulletin boards, chat rooms, email	Offers medium of communication, promotes networking	Unknown effectiveness, may be treated as invasive or as spam, potential for third party surveillance, selective access
Fundraising	Convenience and access	Access to Internet users is selective

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9/9/02 Summary of discussion on the question:

¿ What are the issues related to student activism? Why is activism talked about in the media and in academia?

• It’s the majority of activism being practiced; large numbers of students are mobilized for activism
• Students feel that they don’t have an impact on society
• Students feel that they can make a difference and activism is a way to facilitate change
• In college, activism offers a first opportunity to participate as a full citizen
• To evaluate the argument that there is a lack of civic/political engagement among today’s students
• Because there is a wariness of the direction or nature of social change in the activism of students (are students responsible to take control of the nation’s future?)
• Because students’ activism is often at the forefront of social change

¿ How is it that students “do” politics? What activities are political acts for students?

• Voting
• Researching beliefs
• Discussions on and off-line
• Joining groups
• Rallies/protests/marches
• Signing petitions
• Visual statements intended to challenge norms (non-verbal cues like manner of dress and hair style)
• Bumper stickers, signs, posters
• Graffiti (as a social statement)
• Harassment (e.g., anti-abortion and animal rights protesters throwing blood)
• Actively engaging politics (e.g., recycling, buying free-trade coffee)
• Donations (time/labor, money)
• Performance/art (poetry, music, guerilla theater)
• Humor, satire, irony (e.g., Adbusters)
• Hactivism

¿ How do student organizations “do” politics?

• Encourage voting and registration
• Petition/lobby to change the issues and positions addressed in the classroom
• Do research and information provision, also provide ease of access to issue relevant literature
• Organize meetings, conferences, and speakers
• Part of network with other organizations
• Organize rallies and protests
• Create and distribute posters, bumper stickers
• Organize acts of civil disobedience
• Advocate of positions on political issues
• Promote individual’s active engagement of politics and political issues
• Promote conscientious consumption
• Apply humor, satire, and irony to probe political issues
• Organize fundraising efforts