Introduction

This chapter looks at the use of social media as a tool of protest by the urban poor of Rio de Janeiro and its incorporation into the mainstream press. Internet access and use of social media has been steadily rising in Brazil's favelas (self-built communities of the urban poor) over the past years, reflecting the increase in internet use in the country as a whole, particularly in urban areas, where it has become an important instrument for civic engagement (see, for example, Holmes 2012). The mass demonstrations of 2013 were perhaps the best example of how large crowds all over Brazil could be mobilised on online platforms such as Facebook and Twitter for large-scale street protests against the state, in this case against corruption and mismanagement of the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.

The focus of this chapter, however, is not on massive internet campaigns, but on one example of the many small-scale online protests initiated by young favela residents against human rights violations, some of which have occurred in the wake of the Rio state government's policy of favela ‘pacifica-tion’ and the city's preparation for the two mega events. The case reported here is of a Facebook campaign that was launched by favela youth after the fatal shooting of a young man by military police in a ‘pacified’ favela.

This ‘favela online media activism’ (Custódio 2016) is a recent development of Latin American traditions of communication for social change (Gumucio-Dagron and Tufte 2006) and participatory media (Peruzzo 1996; Rodriguez 2011). Recent research from Brazil has pointed to the potential of often youth-led media collectives from favelas to act as a democratising force that helps to mobilise ‘off-line activism’ (Custódio 2014) in the form of street protests or photographic documentation and exhibition of social issues (see Souza 2013; Custódio 2014; Willis et al. 2014). Importantly, some of this user-created content is increasingly incorporated into Rio's mainstream press. By interacting with mainstream media in this way, favela activists take an import step towards being recognised as civic actors rather than being regarded as threats or mere victims of state violence.