Relational Mobilization under Constraint: Social Media, Peer Networks, and Youth Participation in Repressive Contexts

This article examines how social media and peer networks shape political participation under repressive constraint. Drawing on Resource Mobilization, the study conceptualizes digital engagement as both an informational infrastructure and a relational field through which collective action can be enabled in low trust environments. A convergent mixed methods design was employed by integrating survey data from 208 university students with fifteen in depth interviews with protest participants. Binary logistic regression analyses indicate that daily social media use is a strong predictor of protest participation after exposure to mobilizing content. Peer encouragement is also positively associated with participation, whereas generalized peer support is not. Qualitative accounts are consistent with these patterns, showing how reported direct encouragement, shared emotions, and moral outrage helped translate online engagement into on the ground mobilization. These findings conceptualize digital participation as relational resource mobilization, where credibility and affect operate as mobilizing capital. The study contributes to debates on the digital transformation of activism by situating connective action within a repressive political environment. It argues that in the absence of formal organization, moral and emotional ties transmitted through social media can sustain participation and reconstitute civic agency.