The role of the internet and social networking websites in the recent uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt is extraordinary.  Despite governmental efforts to shut down communication in both countries, people were able to get the word out about their bloody struggles for democratic leadership, leading to a whole new understanding of the value of websites like Facebook.

The Tunisian revolution was set off by the suicide of a university-educated and unemployed man on December 17^th.  The man set himself on fire in protest of the confiscation of his food and produce cart due to improper permits. 

Following this public suicide, people all over the nation began protesting, and first-hand accounts began appearing on Facebook.  The first few weeks of protests went virtually unnoticed by the international media, and in a country where free speech is unheard of and dissent is forbidden, the local media was forced to ignore the events.  Even YouTube has been banned in the country for years.

According to an article by Ben Kerson, who lived in Tunisia for 2 years, “over the past three years, social networking has become the premier way to receive unsanctioned information in Tunisia.”  The protestors used Facebook to instantly spread information, which in turn fueled the revolutionary fire.

I am lucky enough to have several Tunisian friends that I’m connected with on Facebook, and as they began posting videos, pictures, and status updates about the violence and protests, I started to search for information in the media.  Yet it wasn’t until just before their former president, Ben Ali, was ousted on January 14^th that I finally started finding articles from sources like Al Jazeera and the New York Times.  If it wasn't for social media, many believe that this revolution would not have been possible.

While the Tunisians used Facebook to organize themselves and their uprising in December and mid-January, the Egyptians followed suit at the end of January.  Street demonstrations that were organized using social media terrified the Mubarak regime, which instructed most of the phone and internet services providers to cut their services on January 28^th, an unprecedented loss of connectivity for Egypt or any country.

According to the New York Times, “the shutdown caused a 90 percent drop in data traffic to and from Egypt, crippling an important communications tool used by antigovernment protesters and their supporters to organize and to spread their message.”  This move, which lasted five days, is sure to have a dire impact on the Egyptian economy.  The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) estimates the direct costs to be at least $90 million for the 5-day shutdown.

Though the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt seem to have had a great deal of success, it must be noted that they are not over, and their situations will need to be carefully handled until stable democratic governments can be established.  

Still, these two revolutions mark a turning point in political power.  It is clear that social networking provides political amateurs with power they’ve never before had, and leadership must be ready to cooperate with this shifted dynamic, or face the consequences.