Greg Elmer

This book questions the predominance of “media abundance” as a guiding concept for contemporary mediated politics. The authors argue that media abundance is not a universal condition, and that certain individuals, communities, and even nations can more accurately be referred to as media scarce – where access to media technologies and content is limited, highly controlled, or surveilled.Through case studies that focus on guerilla militants, incarcerated Indigenous people, and cold war-era infrastructure, including Soviet “closed” or “secret” cities and Canadian nuclear bunkers, the book’s chapters interrogate how the once media scarce later “speak” to – and can be heard by – the predominant, abundant media culture. Drawing from several art projects and diverse cultural sites, the book highlights how media scarce communities negotiate and otherwise narrate their place in the world, their past experiences and lives, and escape from subjugation. To better understand media scarce politics, the book asks how and when communities become – by accident or force, by choice or necessity – media scarce.This innovative and insightful text will appeal to students and scholars around the world working in the areas of media and politics, art and politics, visual studies, surveillance studies, and communication studies.

This book questions the predominance of “media abundance” as a guiding concept for contemporary mediated politics. The authors argue that media abundance is not a universal condition, and that certain individuals, communities, and even nations can more accurately be referred to as media scarce – where access to media technologies and content is limited, highly controlled, or surveilled.Through case studies that focus on guerilla militants, incarcerated Indigenous people, and cold war-era infrastructure, including Soviet “closed” or “secret” cities and Canadian nuclear bunkers, the book’s chapters interrogate how the once media scarce later “speak” to – and can be heard by – the predominant, abundant media culture. Drawing from several art projects and diverse cultural sites, the book highlights how media scarce communities negotiate and otherwise narrate their place in the world, their past experiences and lives, and escape from subjugation. To better understand media scarce politics, the book asks how and when communities become – by accident or force, by choice or necessity – media scarce.This innovative and insightful text will appeal to students and scholars around the world working in the areas of media and politics, art and politics, visual studies, surveillance studies, and communication studies.

From the social media-based 2008 Obama election campaign to the civic protest and political revolutions of the 2011 Arab Spring, the past few years have been marked by a widespread and complex shift in the political landscape, as the rise of participatory platforms – such as YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and blogs – have multiplied the venues for political communication and activism. This book explores the emergence of a permanent campaign – the need for constant readiness – on networked communication platforms, focusing on political moments, crises and elections in Canada, the U.S.A., and Australia. The book chapters investigate the proliferation of new political actors and communicators: political bloggers, advocacy groups, diverse publics, and political party staff as they engage in political maneuvers across participatory platforms. With in-depth analyses of some of the most well-known participatory media today, this book offers a critical assessment of the constant efforts at managing the plurality of voices that characterize contemporary politics.

From the social media-based 2008 Obama election campaign to the civic protest and political revolutions of the 2011 Arab Spring, the past few years have been marked by a widespread and complex shift in the political landscape, as the rise of participatory platforms – such as YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, and blogs – have multiplied the venues for political communication and activism. This book explores the emergence of a permanent campaign – the need for constant readiness – on networked communication platforms, focusing on political moments, crises and elections in Canada, the U.S.A., and Australia. The book chapters investigate the proliferation of new political actors and communicators: political bloggers, advocacy groups, diverse publics, and political party staff as they engage in political maneuvers across participatory platforms. With in-depth analyses of some of the most well-known participatory media today, this book offers a critical assessment of the constant efforts at managing the plurality of voices that characterize contemporary politics.

Much public debate ensued after the violence and police brutality that gripped Toronto in June 2010 during the G8/G20 Summit. It is now being revealed how the Conservative government's stimulus package was funnelled into "infrastructure" projects aimed at policing Canadians who wished to protest the summit. Renzi and Elmer argue that the Canadian state cultivated an image of the city's financial district as a zone at risk from domestic--or "embedded"--threats. The rationale for "policing" protestors, both peaceful ones and the so-called "black bloc," relied on new forms of state infrastructure redefined through financial, legal, and bio-political frameworks. Infrastructure Critical reveals more than the thin line between security and massive infringement on civil rights; it argues that progressive responses need to understand the logic of state governance in a global economic context.