Click, Post, Fight! Add Yours and Connective Action on Instagram

Paramita Winny Hapsari, Muhammad Fachri Shandika Iman, Reny Henriyani, Nur Iman, Mahbub Ubaedi Alwi

Abstract


Social media today functions not only as a platform for entertainment but also as a medium for digital activism, facilitating connective action through its various affordances. This study explores the use of Instagram's Add Yours feature as a critical tool in enabling digital connective action within socio-political campaigns, particularly in the context of the “Tolak UU TNI” movement. The study aims to understand how the interactive Add Yours feature facilitates mass mobilization and representations of resistance. A qualitative approach is employed using Roland Barthes' semiotic analysis. The theoretical frameworks of Social Shaping of Technology (SST) and platform political economy are applied to analyse the construction of meaning and power dynamics embedded in the use of the feature. Findings indicate that Add Yours has transformed from a tool of personal interaction into a medium of collective symbolic resistance. Its affordances encourage broad participation, solidarity, and message dissemination without relying on formal hierarchical structures, reflecting the active role of users in shaping technological function. However, this potential operates within a dynamic interplay among user interests, corporate agendas, and state regulations, revealing that the feature is not neutral but is co-constructed by the policies of the communication technology industry that shape the trajectory and limits of digital activism. This study contributes to a deeper understanding of social media's role in contemporary activism and the paradoxes of digital platforms.


Keywords


add yours; affordance; connective action; platform political economy; semiotics;

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References


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DOI: https://doi.org/10.20527/issj.v8i1.18423

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