Inside the "People of the Wheelbarrows": participation between online and offline dimension in the post-quake social movement

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to analyze a social movement which emerged after the earthquake in L'Aquila (Italy): "The People of the Wheelbarrows". With triangulation of semi-structured interviews, offline ethnography and content analysis of the movement's Facebook group we tried to answer to the following research question: how is the movement's participation articulated between online and the offline dimensions? Our findings show the importance of the local level, the continuous interplay between the online and the offline and the simultaneous use of a variety of online platforms. The results highlight the role that the Web has played in the coordination of the movement and in the management of meetings and events and show that when physical spaces collapse, online spaces acquire a vital importance.