ICT Use and Entrepreneurial Mobilization of Chinese Grassroots Activists in and beyond Cyberspace

While prevailing scholarship commonly asserts that information and communication technologies (ICTs) significantly facilitate mass mobilization, a growing body of literature questions the mobilization potential of technologies alone. This literature proposes that ICTs might redirect offline participation by promoting low-risk and low-cost online collective actions, especially in the absence of linkage between offline and online tactics. In the context of these debates, this article explores the nuanced synergies between the online and offline mobilization strategies of individual activists and their underlying motives. It does so through an in-depth ethnographic case study of popular protest mobilization in a Chinese locality. Through an integration of the traditional entrepreneurial mobilization model with the concept of mediatization, this study delves into the intricate mobilization strategies and underlying motives of activists. The findings reveal that through a strategic convergence of offline and online tactics, including extension, amalgamation, and substitution, activists adeptly choreographed and presented protest repertoires, thereby fostering the development of mass mobilization. The research posits that the efficacy of ICTs in mobilization is contingent upon activists’ adeptness in leveraging the norms and practices of ICTs to pursue collective objectives suited to social contexts, thus circumventing the pitfalls of “clicktivism.”