Standing still or ascending in the social media political participation ladder? Evidence from Iran

INTRODUCTION[Up]

In recent years, social media have become the fastest spreading service in the world, altering many aspects of daily life from communication, education, business, and even politics. Social media are digital platforms that allow their users to create profiles, share content and build a network of contacts (Boyd, Danah. 2008. “Facebook’s privacy trainwreck: Exposure, invasion, and social convergence”, Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies, 14 (1): 13-20. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856507084416‍Boyd, 2008). As an online communication tool, social media have changed the way political content is processed and transmitted while its interactive nature enables a variety of activities that were not so easy to achieve with the traditional media (Eveland, William P. 2004. “The effect of political discussion in producing informed citizens: The roles of information, motivation, and elaboration”, Political Communication, 21 (2): 177-193. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10584600490443877‍Eveland, 2004). Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, and Instagram are considered the most popular social media in the Western world, that have been characterised not only as essential sources of information but also as platforms of political engagement (Cho, Jaeho, Dhavan V. Shah, Jack M. McLeod, Douglas M. McLeod, Rosanne M. Scholl and Melissa R. Gotlieb. 2009. “Campaigns, reflection, and deliberation: Advancing an OSROR model of communication effects”, Communication Theory, 19 (1): 66-88. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2885.2008.01333.x‍Cho et al., 2009).

A first indicator of the growing popularity of social media both, in informing citizens but also for online and offline political participation was illustrated in the 2008 US Presidential elections. Obama’s campaign used social media not only to raise funds but to ‘’develop a groundswell of empowered volunteers who felt that they could make a difference” (Aaker, Jennifer and Victoria Chang. 2009. Obama and the Power of Social Media and Technology. Case No. M321. Stanford: Stanford Graduate School of Business. Available at: https://stanford.io/3e7zRJJ [Last accessed: May 2^nd 2020].‍Aaker and Chang, 2009: 1). Other examples of the use of social media in mobilizing citizens to participate in politics were the marches for immigration reforms initiated in MySpace (Costanza-Chock, Sasha. 2008. “The Immigrant Rights Movement on the Net: Between ‘Web 2.0’ and Comunicación Popular”, American Quarterly, 60 (3): 851-864. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1353/aq.0.0029‍Costanza-Chock, 2008), the Occupy Wall Street movement (Gleason, Benjamin. 2013. “# Occupy Wall Street: Exploring informal learning about a social movement on Twitter”, American Behavioral Scientist, 57 (7): 966-982. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764213479372‍Gleason, 2013), London riots, San Francisco subway mobs and the students’ initiative on Climate Change.

Political information refers to the use of social media to access news sources, while offline political participation addresses a more active stance by participating in rallies, protests or civil associations. However, the use of social media and its effects differ between democracies and authoritarian regimes. In authoritarian regimes, social media are not considered merely as a means of communication, but they hold the potential of increasing political engagement both online and offline. There have been incidents that highlight these prospects, such as the 2009 “Twitter uprising” in Iran (Bentivegna, Sara. 2002. “Politics and new media”, in Leah A. Lievrouw and Sonia Livingston, (eds.), Handbook of New Media: Social Shaping and Consequences of ICTs. London: SAGE Publications. ‍Bentivegna, 2002) and the Arab Spring or “Facebook revolution” in Egypt in 2011 (El-Nawawy, Mohammed and Sahar Khamis. 2012. “Political activism 2.0: Comparing the role of social media in Egypt’s ‘Facebook revolution’ and Iran’s ‘Twitter uprising’”, CyberOrient, 6 (1): 8-33.‍El-Nawawy and Khamis, 2012). Social media have also been studied for their impact on democratization processes in societies where state authorities restrict communication flows.

The present study seeks to provide a more accurate understanding of social media by examining its potential for generating political participation in authoritarian regimes. Iran is selected as a representative authoritarian regime but also for its high level of internet access and its young population that is increasingly familiar with new communication technologies. According to the Global Digital Report (Global Digital Report. 2020. Digital 2020: Iran. Available at: https://bit.ly/2NZxKgu [Last accessed:May 7^th 2019].‍2020), 33 million Iranians are active users of social media platforms. From April 2019 to January 2020, there was a 39 % growth in users. However, these technologies pose new challenges for the Iranian regime that has invested heavily in controlling the internet since it is considered as a foreign ‘’intrusion’’.

This article investigates the extent to which social media played a role in the dynamics of political information and online participation that could assist in advancing the offline participation in authoritarian regimes. The main research question addressed is whether social media opens up new spaces for online political participation and advocates for offline participation in Iran. Under this question, three hypotheses are formulated as follows:

The study aims to make a theoretical contribution based on Arnstein`s (Arnstein, Sherry R. 1969. “A Ladder of Citizen Participation”, Journal of the American Planning Association, 35 (4): 216-224. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/01 944366908977225‍1969) ladder of citizen participation and Macintosh’s (Macintosh, Ann. 2004. “Characterizing e-participation in policy-making”, in Proceedings of the 37th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, IEEE. Computer Society Press. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1109/HICSS.2004.1265300‍2004) e-participation levels, introducing the Social Media Political Participation Ladder (SMPPL) as a representation of the influence of social media in political participation. By testing this theoretical approach in Iran as a case study and based on quantitative data collected from a street survey, this paper offers insights into the stage of the SMPPL where Iranian citizens stand on. The questionnaire that was conducted in the Persian language in April 2019 evaluates a series of multidimensional observations, assessing the influence of social media in engaging the Iranian society politically and the applicability of the developed theoretical model to other cases.

LITERATURE REVIEW[Up]

Social media as a communication tool allows the population to participate more actively in collective action, obtain information, engage in political discussion, and influence a network of friends and family online. Therefore, social media can mobilize various forms of political engagement in society (Xenos, Michael A, Ariadne Vromen and Brian D. Loader. 2014. “The great equalizer? Patterns of social media use and youth political engagement in three advanced democracies”, Information, Communication and Society, 17 (2): 151-167. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.871318‍Xenos et al., 2014). As cited, “online media no longer constitutes alternative but central environments for citizens’ engagement in politics” (Ekström, Mats and Adam Shehata. 2018. “Social media, porous boundaries, and the development of online political engagement among young citizens”, New Media and Society, 20 (2): 740-759. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816670325‍Ekström and Shehata, 2018: 171). However, to understand how the role of social media works in political activity, it is also necessary to take into account the impact of the various types of digital platforms, the portion of the population influenced by these channels and the different political systems (Boulianne, Shelley. 2015. “Social media use and participation: a meta-analysis of current research, Information”, Communication and Society, 18 (5): 524-538. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1008542‍Boulianne, 2015).

In terms of political participation and engagement, the literature provides a broad framework of academic studies. For Brady (Brady, Henry. 1999. “Political Participation”, in John P. Robinson, Philip R. Shaver and Lawrence S. Wrightsman, (eds.), Measures of Political Attitudes. San Diego: Academic Press.‍1999), citizens’ actions and activities must go beyond the political and social interest of discussion, but they should also be able to influence political outcomes and the decisions on social issues made by individuals and groups in society. The modes of political engagement may involve collective actions, information and political participation, production of texts and videos (Ekström, Mats and Adam Shehata. 2018. “Social media, porous boundaries, and the development of online political engagement among young citizens”, New Media and Society, 20 (2): 740-759. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816670325‍Ekström and Shehata, 2018). Therefore, social media brings different forms (traditional or not) of political participation and active citizenship through activism and online discussion, digital platforms, live recording, volunteer registration, petition and online donation (Xenos, Michael A, Ariadne Vromen and Brian D. Loader. 2014. “The great equalizer? Patterns of social media use and youth political engagement in three advanced democracies”, Information, Communication and Society, 17 (2): 151-167. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.871318‍Xenos et al., 2014).

Social media favours political engagement by mobilizing information among the population (Carlisle, Juliet E. and Robert C. Patton. 2013. “Is Social Media Changing How We Understand Political Engagement? An Analysis of Facebook and the 2008 Presidential Election”, Political Research Quarterly, 66 (4): 883-895. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912913482758‍Carlisle and Patton, 2013). According to Ekström and Shehata (Ekström, Mats and Adam Shehata. 2018. “Social media, porous boundaries, and the development of online political engagement among young citizens”, New Media and Society, 20 (2): 740-759. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816670325‍2018), regardless of political motivation, being active in social platforms allows people natural exposure to political content more often, and a certain level of political knowledge is aroused among the public even though it might still be unintentionally. Social media has changed the way political information is processed and transmitted since not only political elites and media professionals are responsible for sharing information, but also ordinary users through their blogs and postings on the network. This free accessibility has allowed the population to obtain a greater abundance of contents on political issues, public control, and accountability (Casero-Ripollés, Andreu. 2018. “Research on political information and social media: Key points and challenges for the future”, El Profesional de la Información, 27 (5): 964-974. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2018.sep.01‍Casero-Ripollés, 2018).

Besides, the variety of media channels on the market has a differentiated impact on access to information or how political content is mobilized. Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are more open channels that have a broad user base and allow people easy access to politicians’, party organizations’ and other political associations’ public accounts and research networks. They are also accessible platforms through any hardware device, i.e. computers, tablets, smartphones. Snapchat brings a more private setting and a more informal means of communication, but it has fewer profiling capabilities and can only be accessed by a mobile device. The difference in the character limitation of these channels also interferes with the communication transmitted between citizens. Facebook is a platform that allows 63,206 characters; Instagram 2,200 characters; and Twitter, only 280 characters (Bossetta, Michael. 2018. “The Digital Architectures of Social Media: Comparing Political Campaigning on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat in the 2016 U.S. Election”, Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly, 95 (2): 1-26. ‍Bossetta, 2018).

Moreover, the technological evolution of online tools is a factor that has allowed an increase in the political participation of the last years. Discussion spaces integrated by chats and online research were already present much earlier in the digital world, but their impacts were much limited in terms of political engagement (Carlisle, Juliet E. and Robert C. Patton. 2013. “Is Social Media Changing How We Understand Political Engagement? An Analysis of Facebook and the 2008 Presidential Election”, Political Research Quarterly, 66 (4): 883-895. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912913482758‍Carlisle and Patton, 2013). The flexibility of the current social media is part of this evolution that brings better political interaction among citizens by creating “opportunities for political participation: enabling, engaging and empowering followers for various benefits’’ (Effing, Robbin, Jos van Hillegersbergand and Theo Huibers. 2011. “Social Media and Political Participation: Are Facebook, Twitter and YouTube Democratizing Our Political Systems?”, in Efthimios Tambouris, Ann Macintosh and Hans De Bruijn, (eds.), Electronic Participation. Berlin: Heidelberg. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-23333-3_3‍Effing et al., 2011: 30). In addition to online political participation, authors such as Mossberger et al. (Mossberger, Karen, Caroline J. Tolbert and Ramona S. McNeal. 2008. Digital Citizenship: The Internet, Society and Participation. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Available at: https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/7428.001.0001‍2008) believe that social media reinforces offline participation patterns. Offline mode of engagement refers to candidate donations, public deliberations, and demonstrations. Through dissemination on digital platforms, it is possible to mobilize large groups of people to engage in public hearings, political rallies, and street protests. Although Margetts et al. (Margetts, Helen, Peter John, Scot Hale and Taha Yasseri. 2015. Political Turbulence: How Social Media Shape Collective Action. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Available at: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctvc773c7‍2015) understand that online participation is still a secondary political route compared to offline mode, still it does not exclude the importance of its influence.

On the other hand, other authors (Zhang, Weiwu, Thomas J. Johnson, Trent Seltzer and Shannon L. Bichard. 2010. “The Revolution Will be Networked: The Influence of Social Networking Sites on Political Attitudes and Behavior”, Social Science Computer Review, 28 (1): 75-92. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894439309335162‍Zhang et al., 2010) refute the significant dimension of online activities in political participation. These activities through social media are restricted and directed to the digital universe; they do not directly affect institutions or politicians per se, nor do they produce effective results in the political participation of citizens. Social media can influence political behaviour through online discussions. However, little is reflected in the individual’s political attitude (ibid.). Baumgartner and Morris (Baumgartner, Jody C. and Jonathan S. Morris. 2009. “MyFaceTube Politics Social Networking Web Sites and Political Engagement of Young Adults”, Social Science Computer Review, 28 (1): 24-44. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/0894439 309334325‍2009) state that online activities such as blogging and personal opinion posts politicians do not necessarily lead users to participate offline in politics.

In this way, social platforms facilitate political involvement by being able to attract a wide range of users. This is due to their favourable accessibility, their presence in daily habits, the advantageous cost and less demanding political efforts and commitments. Social media ensures a low cost of access to political information and mobilization compared to other instruments (newspapers, magazines, books, posters, flyers) (Carlisle, Juliet E. and Robert C. Patton. 2013. “Is Social Media Changing How We Understand Political Engagement? An Analysis of Facebook and the 2008 Presidential Election”, Political Research Quarterly, 66 (4): 883-895. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912913482758‍Carlisle and Patton, 2013). Because of the speed and reach of information transmission, social media can reduce the gap between the more and less politically engaged (Ekström, Mats and Adam Shehata. 2018. “Social media, porous boundaries, and the development of online political engagement among young citizens”, New Media and Society, 20 (2): 740-759. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816670325‍Ekström and Shehata, 2018) and promote the balance of digital participation independent of income, gender, and ethnicity (Carlisle, Juliet E. and Robert C. Patton. 2013. “Is Social Media Changing How We Understand Political Engagement? An Analysis of Facebook and the 2008 Presidential Election”, Political Research Quarterly, 66 (4): 883-895. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912913482758‍Carlisle and Patton, 2013). At the same time, social media can push citizens to political engagement from small efforts such as simple sharing of information, posting short comments and signing petitions online to tailor the availability and intent of each individual.

Thus, social media ends up being used for political engagement by a profile of the public more inclined by these ways. Based on the Rainie’s Internet and American Life Project (Rainie, Lee, Aaron Smith, Henry Brady and Sidney Verba. 2012. Social Media and Political Engagement. Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project. Available at: https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-4666-0315-8.ch003‍2012) younger users are more likely to post links of political content and personal opinions to engage in social networking political groups than the proportion of the population over fifty years old. Also, in socioeconomic terms, the public that makes use of social platforms is more diverse and less limited when compared to the traditional modes of political and civic participation. This way, in the digital world, inequalities are less noticeable in terms of political engagement.

While McClurg (McClurg, Scott D. 2003. “Social networks and political participation: The role of social interaction in explaining political participation”, Political Research Quarterly, 56 (4): 449-464. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/106591290305600407‍2003) and Xenos et al. (Xenos, Michael A, Ariadne Vromen and Brian D. Loader. 2014. “The great equalizer? Patterns of social media use and youth political engagement in three advanced democracies”, Information, Communication and Society, 17 (2): 151-167. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.871318‍2014) affirm that there is a positive relationship between social media, others such as Ekström and Shehata (Ekström, Mats and Adam Shehata. 2018. “Social media, porous boundaries, and the development of online political engagement among young citizens”, New Media and Society, 20 (2): 740-759. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816670325‍2018) conclude that these digital platforms do not necessarily succeed in promoting politically active citizens. These social media tools often do not help to understand concisely the political process or even partisan ideals under the abundance of information and the difficulty in filtering genuine and meaningful content. Hence decentralization in the production and distribution of political information may lead to ambiguities and inaccurate data. The anonymity and the amount of false news in social media platforms influence the quality of communication (Casero-Ripollés, Andreu. 2018. “Research on political information and social media: Key points and challenges for the future”, El Profesional de la Información, 27 (5): 964-974. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3145/epi.2018.sep.01‍Casero-Ripollés, 2018). As mentioned, “thus it is important to consider both the process by which information is gained (learning from political information) and the outcome of such information (gains in political knowledge)” (Bode, Leticia. 2015. “Political News in the News Feed: Learning Politics from Social Media”, Mass Communication and Society, 19 (1): 1-25. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/15205436.2015.1045149‍Bode, 2015: 2). The posted comments have also followed a line of hostilities, which has led to more divisive debates and no substantial content. Likewise, by allowing people to select their network of friends, pages, and content, it is possible that through social media citizens are receiving only part of the knowledge and the necessary political information (Fountain, Megan. 2017. Social Media and its Effects in Politics: The Factors that Influence Social Media use for Political News and Social Media use Influencing Political Participation. Wood, Thomas and Acree, Brice (dirs.). Department of Political Science, Ohio State University. ‍Fountain, 2017).

The role of social media may also vary according to the culture and political system of a country. While this should not be asserted, for Boulianne (Boulianne, Shelley. 2015. “Social media use and participation: a meta-analysis of current research, Information”, Communication and Society, 18 (5): 524-538. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2015.1008542‍2015), there is a higher likelihood that a strong relationship exists between social media and political engagement in well-established democracies. According to Reuter and Szakonyi (Reuter, Ora. J. and David Szakonyi. 2013. “Online Social Media and Political Awareness in Authoritarian Regimes”, British Journal of Political Science, 45 (1): 29-51. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123413000203‍2013), the use of social media can raise political awareness in authoritarian regimes, if the network itself has been politicized by anti-regime activists to contain political information. Howard et al. (Howard, Philip. N., Sheetal D. Agarwal and Muzammil M. Hussain. 2011. “When Do States Disconnect Their Digital Networks? Regime Responses to the Political Uses of Social Media”, The Communication Review, 14 (3): 216-232. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/10714421.2011.597254‍2011) also report that social media played a central role in shaping political debates, disseminating democratic ideas vital to the promotion of revolutionary online conversations that preceded street protests and events during the Arab Spring.

SOCIAL MEDIA POLITICAL PARTICIPATION LADDER[Up]

Active citizen participation in politics is observed in acts such as voting, campaigning, protesting organizations, and contacting representatives and officials. It is generally perceived as a voluntary act to influence elections or public actions (Verba, Sidney, Kay L. Schlozman and Henry E. Brady. 1995. Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.‍Verba et al., 1995). However, political participation has been mainly associated with higher levels of income and education, as well as specific groups, syndicates, and organized activist groups (Smith, Aaron, Kay L. Schlozman, Sidney Verba and Henry E. Brady. 2009. “The Internet and Civic Engagement”, Pew Research Center, 01-09-09. Available at: https://pewrsr.ch/2O74fJq [Last accessed: April 16^th 2019].‍Smith et al., 2009). In order to engage in active political participation, citizens need firstly a certain level of political information and also being accustomed to expressing themselves and engaging in debates. In this sense, political participation resembles different stages or levels that require both individual and collective understanding. When analyzing the process or stages of political participation, there are important things to consider such as the availability and distribution of political information, citizens’ views on government policy decisions, and the active participation of society in the political agenda. Arnstein (Arnstein, Sherry R. 1969. “A Ladder of Citizen Participation”, Journal of the American Planning Association, 35 (4): 216-224. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/01 944366908977225‍1969) and Macintosh (Macintosh, Ann. 2004. “Characterizing e-participation in policy-making”, in Proceedings of the 37th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, IEEE. Computer Society Press. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1109/HICSS.2004.1265300‍2004) have organized scales that seem to address most of these aspects.

Arnstein’s work (Arnstein, Sherry R. 1969. “A Ladder of Citizen Participation”, Journal of the American Planning Association, 35 (4): 216-224. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/01 944366908977225‍1969) develops eight rungs on a ladder of citizen participation. The lower level involves two rungs, manipulation and therapy, which refer to non-citizen participation and therefore political submission to the powerholders. The next three degrees, namely informing, consultation, and placation, refer to tokenism: a political opportunity for citizens to obtain information but also to give their opinion on political issues. Finally, the last three degrees, namely partnership, delegated power and citizen control, describe citizen power that allows society to have an active voice in political decision making.

The traditional approaches on political participation do not fully engage with the complexities of the participatory process (Carpentier, Nico. 2016. “Beyond the ladder of participation: An analytical toolkit for the critical analysis of participatory media processes”, Javnost-The Public, 23 (1): 70-88. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/13183222.2016.1149760‍Carpentier, 2016) and especially the new technology dynamics. The commencement of the internet and its constant developments altered the way information is transmitted providing access to various sources while being accessible from any place at any time. This accessibility increases the level and intensity of political information that could produce a more politically active public (Kurtz, Howard. 1995. “Webs of Political Intrigue: candidates, media looking for internet Constituents”, Washington Post, 13-11-95. Available at: https://wapo.st/2Z47zLU [Consulted: 22 May 2019].‍Kurtz, 1995). Macintosh’s work (Macintosh, Ann. 2004. “Characterizing e-participation in policy-making”, in Proceedings of the 37th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, IEEE. Computer Society Press. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1109/HICSS.2004.1265300‍2004) addresses these new developments brought by the internet by developing an e-participation level model. The first stage in the ladder is the e-Enabling, which provides access to information and a better understanding of the transmitted political content. The second stage is e-Engaging, which provides a space where people can interact and take part in different activities such as greater citizen involvement in deliberative debates on government policies. The last stage is e-Empowering, that urges users to collaborate, engage in tasks and initiatives thus promoting active citizen participation that could shape the government’s political agenda.

However, the introduction and widespread use of social media are considered to have even more profoundly shaped political participation both in the online and offline form (Jost, John T., Pablo Barberá, Richard Bonneau, Melanie Langer, Megan Metzger, Jonathan Nagler, Joanna Sterling and Joshua Tucker. 2018. “How social media facilitates political protest: Information, motivation, and social networks”, Political psychology, 39 (11): 85-118. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1111/pops.12478‍Jost et al., 2018). Social media platforms provide a wide range of information on different topics and engage users in a series of online initiatives facilitating opportunities for communication and deliberation such as petitions, social movements, organizing volunteering activities and assisting in political campaigns. These initiatives represent an observable change towards the democratization of political expression (Castells, Manuel. 2012. Networks of outrage and hope: Social movements in the Internet age. Malden: Polity Press.‍Castells, 2012). An essential aspect of social media empowerment is that it starts from the individual level and is not imposed or introduced by politicians. It is the citizens who decide to follow or support a political person and at the same time, establish initiatives and even provide information. There is a growing number of people who use exclusively social media sources to read the news and be informed on particular issues, mainly Twitter and Linkedin. The platforms also allow comment sections for users to discuss.

Based on these considerations, we develop the Social Media Political Participation Ladder, which identifies three stages or steps of political participation (Figure 1). The first step represents the various sources for acquiring information in social media platforms including news, commentaries and on-spot coverage of events taking place through live videos.

After having climbed this step of the ladder, citizens can proactively engage in online discussions, create pages, support petitions and political campaigns making their voices heard. The last step indicates that after the users have been informed and engaged in online deliberations, they seek a more active offline political participation as it also observed in other studies (Skoric, Marko M. and Nathaniel Poor. 2013. “Youth engagement in Singapore: The interplay of social and traditional media”, Journal of Broadcasting and Electronic Media, 57 (2): 187-204. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/08838151.2013.787076‍Skoric and Poor, 2013; Vitak, Jessica, Paul Zube, Andrew Smock, Caleb T. Carr, Nicole Ellison and Cliff Lampe. 2011. “It’s complicated: Facebook users’ political participation in the 2008 election”, CyberPsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 14 (3): 107-114. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2009.0226‍Vitak et al., 2011). Thus, the ladder represents a process that makes use of all tools and initiatives provided by social media to advance active citizenry.

IRAN’S POLITICAL SYSTEM AND CENSORSHIP OF SOCIAL MEDIA[Up]

Since the 1979 revolution, Iran’s regime was established as the first Islamic republic system in the world, governed by religious authorities and the law of Sharia as an integral part of the country’s legal code. According to Ayatollah Khomeini —the founder of the Islamic Republic—, Islam defines the provisions for the political life since “Islam itself is democratic” (Vatanka, Alex. 2015. “The Authoritarian Resurgence: Iran Abroad.”, Journal of Democracy 26 (2): 61-70. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1353/jod.2015.0037‍Vatanka, 2015). Numerous terms have been used to describe the regime, such as democratic theocracy, religious democracy (Schmid, Peter D. 2002. “Expect the unexpected: A religious democracy in Iran”, The Brown Journal of World Affairs, 9 (2): 181-196. ‍Schmid, 2002) and even “mullocracy”^‍‍[1] (Kurun, Ismail. 2017. “Iranian Political System: ‘Mullocracy?’”, Journal of Management and Economics Research, 15 (1): 113-129. Available at: https://doi.org/10.11611/yead.285351‍Kurun, 2017). However, the political system in Iran seems to reveal a rather complex network of elected and non-elected institutions affecting the decision-making process. Its hybrid nature is manifested with a “constitutional compromise between the secular and clerical components” and its distinct format of the electoral procedure (Pejman Abdolmohammadi and Giampiero Cama. 2015. “Iran as a Peculiar Hybrid Regime: Structure and Dynamics of the Islamic Republic”, British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, 42 (4): 558-578. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/13530194.2015.1037246‍Pejman and Giampiero, 2015). Despite this fact, the Islamic Republic of Iran holds elections regularly; the procedures fall short of democratic standards and equal representation while the Supreme leader profoundly influences the process. Regarding the electoral procedure, the ballot is candidate-based (Zaccara, Luciano. 2012. “The 2009 Iranian presidential elections in comparative perspective”, in Anoushiravan Ehteshami and Reza Molavi (eds.), Iran and the international system. New York: Routledge.‍Zaccara, 2012) and public support on the nominated candidates is rather circumstantial and not ideological (Ehteshami, Anoushiravan and Luciano Zaccara. 2013. “Reflections on Iran’s 2013 Presidential Elections”, Orient, 4 (54): 7-14.‍Ehteshami and Zaccara, 2013). These peculiarities in the Iranian system accounting for “limited level of pluralism”, “low electoral integrity” and “inexistence of governmental alternation” better positioning the political regime under the notion of “hegemonic pluralist authoritarianism” (Szmolka, Inmaculada. 2017. “Successful and Failed Transitions to Democracy”, in Inmaculada Szmolka (ed.), Political Change in the Middle East and North Africa: After the Arab Spring. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Available at: https://doi.org/10.3366/edinburgh/9781474415286.003.0016‍Szmolka, 2017).

Nevertheless, Iran’s political system has been criticized by political elites and international organizations in the West mainly on election-related violations, freedom of speech, inequality of gender and human rights (Tazmini, Ghoncheh. 2009. Khatami’s Iran: the Islamic Republic and the turbulent path to reform. London and New York: IB Tauris. Available at: https://doi.org/10.5040/9780755610105‍Tazmini, 2009). The Polity Progress report (2014) gives Iran a scoring of -7, that entails minimal political participation in the country and places it among the “autocracies”. The Freedom House’s latest report on political rights and civil liberties (Freedom House. 2019. Freedom in the World 2019: Iran. Available at: https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2019/iran‍2019) designated Iran as “not free” with an aggregate score of 18 out of 100 whereas the Rule of Law Index (World Justice Project. 2020. Rule of Law Index 2020.Available at: https://bit.ly/2VUBRid [Last accessed: May 11^th 2020].‍World Justice Project, 2020) ranks Iran 102 out of 126. In addition, the Committee to Protect Journalists report (2019) evaluating the most censored countries, places Iran in position number 7 and the Word Press Freedom Index places Iran in position 173 out of 180 countries indicating the tightening grip of the Iranian regime on all media forms (RSF-Reporters without Borders. 2020. World Press Index. Available at: https://rsf.org/en/ranking [Last accessed: 2 May 2020].‍Reporters without Borders, 2020).

The authoritarianism of the Iranian regime is particularly evident in the realm of information technology and social media, with the hiring of thousands of “cyber-jihadists” to monitor and control social media (Milani, Abbas. 2015. “The Authoritarian Resurgence: Iran’s Paradoxical Regime”, Journal of Democracy, 26 (2): 52-60. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1353/jod.2015.0034‍Milani, 2015) but also to “stifle political opposition that operates in cyberspace” (Vatanka, Alex. 2015. “The Authoritarian Resurgence: Iran Abroad.”, Journal of Democracy 26 (2): 61-70. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1353/jod.2015.0037‍Vatanka, 2015). During Mohammad Khatami’s government (1997-‍2005), censorship and repression of the media were relatively low, allowing for substantial growth in the use of social media and blogs (Iran Media Program. 2014. Liking Facebook in Tehran: Social Networking in Iran. Available at: https://bit.ly/31TjnlZ [Last accessed: 30 April 2020].‍Iran Media Program, 2014). Orkut stood out as one of the most accessed platforms in Iran in 2004, reconfiguring the flow of communication (Eloranta, Jari, Hossein Kermani and Babak Rahimi. 2015. “Facebook Iran: Social Capital and the Iranian Social Media”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Eloranta et al., 2015). YouTube and Facebook were also popular in obtaining information and sharing videos of protests; however, Twitter was not, even before its blockade in 2009 (Esfandiari, Golnaz. 2017. Iranian Politicians Who Use Twitter Despite State Ban. RFE/RL: Free Media In Unfree Societies. Available at: https://www.rferl.org/a/iranian-politicians-twitter-ban/28701701.html [Last accessed: May 11^th 2020].‍Esfandiari, 2017).

Iranian online social media has played a significant role in shaping social capital (Eloranta, Jari, Hossein Kermani and Babak Rahimi. 2015. “Facebook Iran: Social Capital and the Iranian Social Media”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Eloranta et al., 2015), in empowering marginalized groups (Gheytanchi, Elham. 2015. “Gender Roles in the Social Media World of Iranian Women”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Gheytanchi, 2015), as an alternative way to censorship of printed media (Michaelsen, Marcus. 2015. “The Politics of Online Journalism in Iran”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Michaelsen, 2015) and as a form of political mobilization (Ekström, Mats and Adam Shehata. 2018. “Social media, porous boundaries, and the development of online political engagement among young citizens”, New Media and Society, 20 (2): 740-759. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444816670325‍Ekström and Shehata, 2018). Thus, creating conditions for a cognitive process of building positive social relationships, facilitating the conduct of civic actions at the local and transnational level (Eloranta, Jari, Hossein Kermani and Babak Rahimi. 2015. “Facebook Iran: Social Capital and the Iranian Social Media”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Eloranta et al., 2015). Since Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s presidency in 2005, the regime tolerates little freedom of expression in traditional media. After the amendment in the Press Law in 2001 by the Council of Guardians, magazines and newspapers are subjected to severe censorship, and a significant number of journalists have been faced with warnings or even imprisonment for the topics they cover (Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ). 2019. Iran / Middle East & North Africa: Journalists attacked in Iran since 1992. Available at: https://cpj.org/mideast/iran/ [Last accessed: May 8^th 2019]‍CPJ, 2019). In this way, reformist journalists identified online social media as another viable tool for expressing alternative views, forming public opinion, deliberating, and sharing information with the exiled community (Michaelsen, Marcus. 2015. “The Politics of Online Journalism in Iran”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Michaelsen, 2015).

However, online activity in Iran is also being monitored while foreign-based websites are banned or filtered, including news sites, search engines, entertainment channels, email domains (Pakravan, Rudabeh. 2012. “Territory Jam: Tehran”, Places Journal, July. Available at: https://doi.org/10.22269/120709‍Pakravan, 2012). Twitter, Facebook, and Telegram were banned. Despite these limitations Iranians remain active and circumvent the state’s filtering technique with other tools such as new proxy servers and virtual private networks (VPNs) (Iran Media Program. 2014. Liking Facebook in Tehran: Social Networking in Iran. Available at: https://bit.ly/31TjnlZ [Last accessed: 30 April 2020].‍Iran Media Program, 2014). In Alami’s (Alami, Abdolreza. 2017. Social media use and political behavior of Iranian university students as mediated by political knowledge and attitude. Adnan, Hamedi Mohid (dir.). University of Malaya, Malaysia.‍2017) and Zogby’s (Zogby, James. 2011. Social media and the Arab Spring. Zogby Research Services. Available at: https://bit.ly/31Sx1Wp [Last accessed: May 14^th 2020].‍2011) survey, Twitter and Facebook were used by Iranians during 2009 to 2013, a period when these networks were already banned. Therefore, there is no official knowledge about the actual number of users and the exact use of social media in Iran. Instagram is currently the only one allowed^‍‍[2] despite a temporary ban in December 2017. More than 47 % of the population uses the application ranking the country as the 7th biggest market for Instagram in the world^‍‍[3].

THE ROLE OF SOCIAL MEDIA IN THE 2009-‍2018 UPRISINGS IN IRAN[Up]

This section analyzes the role of social media in the political uprisings in 2009 and 2018. The victory of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the 2009 elections created unprecedented unrest with public demonstrations in many cities across the country. The candidate of the opposition Mir-Hossein Musavi and his supporters accused the regime of vote-rigging and election fraud. Thousands of citizens took on the streets with the slogan “Where’s my vote?”. These protests over the next months marked the beginning of the “Green Movement” (Dabashi, Hamid. 2013. “What happened to the Green Movement in Iran?”, Al Jazeera, 12-6-2013. Available at: https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/05/201351661225981675.html‍Dabashi, 2013; Esfahlani, Mohammad S. 2015. “The Politics and Anti-Politics of Facebook in Context of the Iranian 2009 Presidential Elections and Beyond”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Esfahlani, 2015). Twitter and other social media were used to encourage more Iranians to come out in protest and broadcast the developments in turmoil. Users outside of Iran moved their Twitter locations to Tehran and changed their time settings as a way to bypass government monitoring (Elson, Sara B., Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader. 2012. “Background on Social Media Use in Iran and Events Surrounding the 2009 Election”, in Sara Beth Elson, Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader (eds.), Using Social Media to Gauge Iranian Public Opinion and Mood After the 2009 Election. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.‍Elson et al., 2012). The campaign “Help Iran to Elections” encouraged Iranians to add green to their profile pictures as a way to support the movement (Bailly, Jordan. 2012. The Impact of Social Media on Social Movements: A Case Study of the 2009 Iranian Green Movement and the 2011 Egyptian Revolution. Cottam, Martha (dir.). Washington State University, Washington.‍Bailly, 2012). However, Ems (Ems, Lindsay. 2014. “Twitter’s place in the tussle: how old power struggles play out on a new stage”, Media, Culture and Society, 36 (5): 720-731. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/0163443714529070‍2014) confirms that only a small number of tweets originated from within the country. Thus, Western journalists and academics, due to the vast number of messages and popular hashtags like #Iranelections, #FreeIran wrongly characterized the movement as the “Twitter Revolution” (Payvand. 2009. Iran’s elections topped Twitter’s list of most popular topics of 2009. Available at: https://bit.ly/3f8Gtc9 [Last accessed: 25 July 2019].‍Payvand, 2009). Studies that analysed the number and content of tweets during the protests discover that they were used to communicate the events in other countries and had “no significant direct impact on the events inside Iran” (Ketabchi, Kaveh, Masoud Asadpour and Seyed Amin Tabatabaei. 2013. “Mutual influence of Twitter and postelection events of Iranian presidential election”, Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 100 (40): 40-56. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sbspro.2013.10.698‍Ketabchi et al., 2013: 54). As per Kadivar, Twitter was mainly used as a “system for publicizing events in Iran to the rest of the world instead of as an organizing tool for Iranians during protests” (Kadivar, Jamileh. 2015. “A Comparative Study of Government Surveillance of Social Media and Mobile Phone Communications during Iran’s Green Movement (2009) and the UK Riots (2011)”, Journal for a Global Sustainable Information Society, 13 (1): 169-191. Available at: https://doi.org/ 10.31269/vol13iss1pp169-191.‍2015: 175).

The government consequently forbade the demonstrations’ coverage and imposed greater control over online activities. The regime also used social media to coerce and threaten activists inside and outside the country (Elson, Sara B., Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader. 2012. “Background on Social Media Use in Iran and Events Surrounding the 2009 Election”, in Sara Beth Elson, Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader (eds.), Using Social Media to Gauge Iranian Public Opinion and Mood After the 2009 Election. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.‍Elson et al., 2012; Michaelsen, Marcus. 2016. “Exit and voice in a digital age: Iran’s exiled activists and the authoritarian state”, Globalizations, 15 (2): 248-264. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1080/14747731.2016.1263078‍Michaelsen, 2016). It even used Twitter to “extract information to identify key leaders and disrupt attempts to organize protests” (German, Kathleen M. 2014. “Social Media and Citizen Journalism in the 2009 Iranian Protests: The Case of Neda Agha-Soltan”, Journal of Mass Communication Journalism, 4 (5): 1-8. Available at: https://doi.org/10.412/2165-7912.1000195‍German, 2014: 4). Due to the measures employed by the regime, the Green Movement started losing its apparatus after February 2011. The movement started being fragmented into different groups, causing a discursive discrepancy further fueled by criticisms in social media that lead to an internal split, due to lack of consensus, collective identity and coordination in this period (Elson, Sara B., Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader. 2012. “Background on Social Media Use in Iran and Events Surrounding the 2009 Election”, in Sara Beth Elson, Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader (eds.), Using Social Media to Gauge Iranian Public Opinion and Mood After the 2009 Election. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.‍Elson et al., 2012; Esfahlani, Mohammad S. 2015. “The Politics and Anti-Politics of Facebook in Context of the Iranian 2009 Presidential Elections and Beyond”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Esfahlani, 2015).

Regarding the political use of social media in the Green Movement, similarities can be seen in the context of the Arab Spring, which represented a series of social demonstrations against the abuse of power by political authorities in the Middle East and North Africa since late 2010. Similar to Iran, social media played a key role in channelling information, showing the government repressions, organizing protests and giving meaning to events of Arab Spring (Brown, Heather, Emily Guskin and Amy Mitchell. 2012. “The Role of Social Media in the Arab Uprisings”, Pew Research Center, 28-11-12. Available at: https://www.journalism.org/2012/11/28/role-social-media-arab-uprisings/ [Last accessed: May 5^th 2020]‍Brown et al., 2012; Tusa, Feliz. 2013. “How Social Media Can Shape a Protest Movement: The Cases of Egypt in 2011 and Iran in 2009”, Arab Media and Society, 7: 1-19. ‍Tusa, 2013). Likewise, Bahrain, Tunisia and other Arab countries used online platforms to track dissidents and promote pro-regime agendas (Dewey, Taylor, Juliane Kaden, Miriam Marks, Shun Matsushima and Beijing Zhu. 2012. The impact of social media on social unrest in the Arab Spring. International Policy Program. Stanford: Stanford University. Available at: https://stanford.io/2Dgohz7 [Last accessed: May 5^th 2020].‍Dewey et al., 2012). Faris (Faris, David M. 2015. “Architectures of Control and Mobilization in Egypt and Iran”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍2015) and Brown et al. (Brown, Heather, Emily Guskin and Amy Mitchell. 2012. “The Role of Social Media in the Arab Uprisings”, Pew Research Center, 28-11-12. Available at: https://www.journalism.org/2012/11/28/role-social-media-arab-uprisings/ [Last accessed: May 5^th 2020]‍2012) share the argument that social media in the 2009 and 2011 uprisings served more to disseminate information and less as a mechanism of political mobilization.

Nevertheless, President Ahmadinejad has been more successful in managing traditional and online media than Arab neighbors (Elson, Sara B., Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader. 2012. “Background on Social Media Use in Iran and Events Surrounding the 2009 Election”, in Sara Beth Elson, Douglas Yeung, Parisa Roshan, S. R. Bohandy and Alireza Nader (eds.), Using Social Media to Gauge Iranian Public Opinion and Mood After the 2009 Election. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation.‍Elson et al., 2012; Faris, David M. 2015. “Architectures of Control and Mobilization in Egypt and Iran”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Faris 2015). In the same manner, Tunisia adopted a similar filtering system; however, the government was not effective in blocking social media (Dewey, Taylor, Juliane Kaden, Miriam Marks, Shun Matsushima and Beijing Zhu. 2012. The impact of social media on social unrest in the Arab Spring. International Policy Program. Stanford: Stanford University. Available at: https://stanford.io/2Dgohz7 [Last accessed: May 5^th 2020].‍Dewey et al., 2012). In Egypt, Mubarak’s government underestimated online political activities from the start. The absence of strict Internet regulation and the neglect of opposition activities on social media led to the regime’s failure (Faris, David M. 2015. “Architectures of Control and Mobilization in Egypt and Iran”, in David M. Faris and Babak Rahimi (eds.), Social media in Iran: politics and society after 2009. Albany: State University of New York Press. ‍Faris, 2015). According to Tusa (Tusa, Feliz. 2013. “How Social Media Can Shape a Protest Movement: The Cases of Egypt in 2011 and Iran in 2009”, Arab Media and Society, 7: 1-19. ‍2013), social media in Iran were used mostly to organize protests during the Green Movement. On the contrary, in Egypt, online platforms were used even before 2011, which made it possible to build a consolidated base of different groups and a stronger revolutionary narrative.

Social media also played an important role in the anti-government demonstrations rocking the country in 2017-‍2018 when new protests burst out in Mashhad against President Hassan Rouhani (Eltagouri, Marwa. 2018. “Tens of thousands of people have protested in Iran. Here’s why”, Washington Post, 03-01-18. Available at: https://wapo.st/2VPUbsP [Last acessed: May 15^th 2019].‍Eltagouri, 2018). The protests arose in response to increased youth unemployment, plans to raise fuel prices and discontent with the Iranian foreign policy asking for the removal of the regime (Asadzade, Peyman. 2018. “New data shed light on the dramatic protests in Iran”, Washington Post, 1-1-2018. Available at: https://wapo.st/2Dd1Cni [Last aceessed: May 8^th 2019].‍Asadzade, 2018). The use of smartphones allowed more people to stay online during the 2018 demonstrations with the hashtags #pashimanam^‍‍[4] (The Economist. 2018. Iran is in turmoil but the clerics and their allies remain entrenched. Available at: https://econ.st/3f6jKNW [Last accessed:May 15^th 2020]‍The Economist, 2018) that accompanied most posts reporting on the protests. Telegram, as a messaging tool, assisted in spreading the news about the events and its ban hindered the protests´ organization.

Nevertheless, these protests were different in nature. In 2009, protesters demanded changes that stayed however under the framework of existing politics, the overthrow of Ahmadinejad’s and the establishment of Mousavi as president, more social freedoms and less oppression by the security forces. Contrarily the 2018 demands were much more radical, with the opposition insisting on the removal of Khamenei from power and the end of the regime (Quinn, Michelle. 2018. “One Difference Between 2009 vs 2018 Iran Protests? 48 Million Smartphones”, VOA, 03-01-18. Available at: https://bit.ly/2Dd5AfG [Last accessed: April 28^th 2019].‍Quinn, 2018; Rajavi, Maryam. 2018. “These Iranian Protests are Different From 2009”, WSJ, 08-01-18. Available at: https://on.wsj.com/2VYNkxk [Last accessed: June 15^th 2019].‍Rajavi, 2018). Additionally, the 2017-‍2018 protests were not centrally organised and not under leadership to cohere into a unified protest movement (Saidi, Mike. 2018. “More Protests, No Progress: the 2018 Iran Protests”, Critical Threats, 28-11-18. Available online: https://bit.ly/2O1hlIb [Last accessed: August 15^th 2019].‍Saidi, 2018). As far as it concerns the impact of social media in these protests, it is observed a noticeable degree of online political activism. Studies using twitter analytics have identified that hashtags such as #IranProtests were primarily used to share news stories, with no personal comments included (Yucesou, Tayfun and Burak Karabulut. 2019. “Iranians Revolution’s Demands under the Shadow of Spiral of Silence: A Content Analysis of Twitter Messages in Iranian Mass Movement”, Global Media Journal: Turkish Edition, 9 (18): 48-70.‍Yucesou and Karabulut, 2019).

METHOD AND SAMPLE[Up]

The study aims to test the theory of the participation ladder in social media. To do so, we employed the case survey research method aiming to combine the benefits of both a survey and a case study, using cross-sectional data and in-depth analysis (Larsson, Rikard. 1993. “Case survey methodology: Quantitative analysis of patterns across case studies”, Academy of management Journal, 36 (6): 1515-1546. Disponible ena. https://doi.org/10.5465/256820‍Larson, 1993). The method is also used to describe population trends or to test questions or hypotheses (Mills, Albert J., Gabrielle Durepos and Elden Wiebe. 2010. Encyclopedia of Case Study Research. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications. Available at: https://doi.org/10.4135/9781412957397‍Mills et al., 2010) and has been particularly devised to study topics such as citizen participation (Levi, Margaret and Laura Stoker. 2000. “Political trust and trustworthiness”, Annual Review of Political Science, 3 (1): 475-507. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.polisci.3.1.475‍Levi and Stoker, 2000; Ekman, Joakim. 2009. “Political Participation and Regime Stability: A Framework for Analyzing Hybrid Regimes”, International Political Science Review, 30 (1): 7-31. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/0192512108097054‍Ekman, 2009). Iran was selected as a single and representative case for upholding fundamental characteristics of authoritarian regimes, particularly in regard to the repression of freedom of speech in the media (Freedom House. 2019. Freedom in the World 2019: Iran. Available at: https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2019/iran‍Freedom House, 2019; The Economist. 2019. Democracy Index 2019. Available at: https://www.eiu.com/topic/democracy-index‍The Economist, 2019).

Conducting interviews in the Middle East has proven quite demanding regarding ethical and political considerations (Clark, Janine A. 2006. “Field research methods in the Middle East”, Political Science and Politics, 39 (3): 417-423. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1049096506060707‍Clark, 2006; Romano, David. 2006. “Conducting research in the Middle East’s conflict zones”, Political Science and Politics, 39 (3): 439-441. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1049096506060768‍Romano, 2006). Structured interviews^‍‍[5] in the form of a questionnaire with close-ended responses were used as an instrument to obtain data, while secondary data were also employed to reinforce the findings. The questionnaire formulated was informed by the theory developed and consisted of 24 questions divided into five sections with the first being the basic demographics, followed by the section on use frequency and preferences in the internet and social media. The latter three sections addressed the political information, online political participation, and offline political participation process. This research corresponds to the concurrent use of social media in Iran, Instagram was mainly referred to as the one officially allowed and the second most visited website in the country (SimilarWeb. 2019. Top websites ranking. Available at: https://www.similarweb.com/top-websites [Last accessed: May 5^th 2020].‍Similarweb, 2019).

The questionnaire was conducted in the Persian language in three Iranian cities Tehran, Shiraz and Zahedan in April 2019, with the assistance of three residents, who were PhD students in social sciences trained for completing the interviews. The three cities differ significantly from one another in population, economic prosperity and educational level, while the number of internet, mobile and social media users varies between them, thus constituting a representative sample of the Iranian society. Tehran is the capital city with 9,135,000 population, 40.2 % of economic participation rate and 24.9 % of the country’s total Internet users; Shiraz is a medium size city of 1,565,572 people and Zahedan is a rather small city with 609,263 population^‍‍[6].

The interviews were conducted by approaching people in streets and parks^‍‍[7] and lasted an average of 10-‍15 minutes. Interviewees were informed that their participation is entirely voluntary, anonymous, to be used for academic purposes and that they can abandon it at any time even after it has been started. Respondents were selected randomly however not all wished to complete the questionnaire, and some left in the middle of the process. The number of fully completed questionnaires was 110 (n = 110). Figure 2 presents the demographic variables.

RESULTS AND ANALYSIS[Up]

DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS[Up]

This article constitutes a contribution to the area of Political Science by analyzing the impact of social media on promoting political participation in Iran as a representative case study of authoritarian regimes. As discussed, the use of social media is vigorously restricted in Iranian society because of its authoritarian political system. As a result of the political censorship in Iran, many of the digital platforms have already been banned from use. By employing a survey conducted in Iran, this study has sought to provide an understanding of the links between social media and political participation.

Accordingly, with the introduction of the Social Media Political Participation Ladder (SMPPL), we list three possible analytical dimensions where social media can gain an influential role: online political information, online and offline political participation. Based on this theoretical underpinning, political participation is perceived as a process whereby the respective society takes a gradual “step-up or stage-up” approach. According to the SMPPL, only after having achieved a higher level of political information, a developed interest in being more involved in online political discussions and initiatives emerges thus, advancing to a more proactive online political behaviour. Consequently, after the second stage of online political participation, further stimulation will encourage an increased propensity to discuss and engage offline, reaching the top of the ladder.

The findings of this study demonstrate that the impact of social media in Iran does work largely in this stepwise format. Furthermore, the responses provided are to a degree consistent with those of Wojcieszak and Smith (Wojcieszak, Magdalena and Briar Smith. 2013.“Will Politics Be Tweeted? New Media Use by Iranian Youth in 2011”, New Media and Society, 16 (1): 91-109. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444813479594‍2013), indicating that the majority of citizens do not use these platforms for political engagement, but to communicate and to discuss personal and work-related issues. However, our results show that Iranian society has started using social media to a greater extent to be informed on the news with Instagram holding a prominent role as a tool of political information. These results allow us to conclude, without generalizing to the whole Iranian society, that social media advance political information, thus, validating our first hypothesis.

Our second hypothesis that considers that social media are used widely for online political participation was not verified with the sample of the survey revealing a rather moderate online political participation in Iran. Thus, considerations that praise the role of social media as a critical element in active political engagement in authoritarian regimes need to be re-evaluated. Finally, there is no validation of the third hypothesis that accounts for significant effects of using social media in offline political participation. A great majority of respondents had not engaged in any format of offline political participation. This may suggest that the fear of the regime is still quite prominent in the country.

In conclusion, the findings of this study match the conclusions of the existing literature on the use and impact of social media in authoritarian regimes. More notably, this article confirms that social media has not impacted drastically active political participation in Iran. In brief, Iranian society is on an ascending process but currently standing on the first stage of political information.