Transnational political cyberactivism: The Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST) of Brazil

Abstract

This article approaches processes of transnational activism via the Internet through a case study of the Landless Rural Workers’ Movement (MST) in Brazil. Analysis of the main discursive themes present in over one hundred online messages that passed between the central office of the movement in Brazil and its support committee in Barcelona, where the fieldwork on which this article is based was carried out during 2008, suggests that a linkage on a theoretical level can be established between global mobilization and the construction of virtual communities. It is argued that the rhetorical content of the messages crystallizes into a certain community ethos that enhances the effectiveness of concerted collective action.