Crowdsourcing as a methodology for global movements: building counter-hegemonic knowledge of de-privatisation

The repertoire of contemporary social movements increasingly includes utilising data in strategic pursuit of their goals. In this paper, we explore the potential for co-produced crowdsourced data in the context of a global, networked movement advocating for the de-privatisation of public services. We argue that crowdsourcing can produce data to inform and strengthen alternative progressive narratives to counteract dominant elite discourses still wedded to increasingly contradictory global neoliberal political and economic governance rhetorics. The building of counter-hegemonic knowledge is particularly critical in the current moment where elite and dominant narratives are being called into question. The paper also contributes to social movement studies by developing the theoretical and conceptual framework of crowdsourcing, to improve its ‘fit’ for co-produced social science. In this way, the paper contributes to social movement scholarship on the role of data; the conceptual development of the methodology itself; and ongoing debates around social movements as knowledge producers.