This document summarizes a research study on political activism among diasporic Bidoon activists during the COVID-19 pandemic. The study aims to understand why the Bidoon undertake activism during crises and how their practices relate to governing regimes. It uses qualitative methods like interviews and identity performance analysis with 6 activist participants. Key findings indicate that activism during crises is a reaction to abuse of power and a precaution, and that direct victims are not the ultimate goal of resistance. It recommends addressing ideological tools of power rather than just those who wield it.

1. Political activism during global crises: Case of diasporic
Bidoon activists during COVID-19 pandemic
Ahmad Jaber
University College London, UK
IDSP Competition 2020
London, 23 July 2020

2. Introduction
• Political activism as identity performances of asymmetrical power
relations (Blommaert, 2018; Rampton & Eley, 2018)
• Abuses of power during state of emergency
• The research purpose is descriptive and explanatory
• Aim: understand abuses of power against the Bidoon and call for
social action

3. Research Framework
• Research questions:
1. Why the diasporic Bidoon undertake political activism during a global crisis?
2. How are the Bidoon’s practices and those of the governing regimes articulated?
• Research paradigm: post-constructivism and critical realism
• Research type: Primary
• Research approach: Qualitative using interviews and identity performance analysis
• Research approach characteristic: Traditional and virtual ethnography

4. Data Collection
• Main population: 6 diasporic Bidoon activists in the UK, US, Canada
and Kuwait
• Sampling strategy: purposive sample
• Data format: text, audio and video
• Collection methods: focus group observation and interview [actively
participatory]
• Collection characteristic: unstructured and semi-structured
• Data transformation: thematic coding [selective]

5. Data analysis
• DA1: Thematic analysis of DC1 & DC2 (RQ1 & RQ2 )
Data via DC1-DC2 coded and analysed as governing and resisting processes in identity
performances of asymmetric power relations (Foucault, 2003; Blommaert, 2018; Rampton &
Eley, 2018)
• DA2: Hermeneutics (RQ1 & RQ2 )
• Data via DC1-DC2 analysed as tied to spatiotemporal contexts (Bakhtin, 1981; Blommaert, 2005)
• Triangulation (RQ1, RQ2)

6. Findings
• Political activism during crises is precaution and
reaction to abuse of power (RQ1)
• Direct victims of violence in power relations are
not the ultimate goal (RQ2)
Limitation: bias in data selection & interpretation
Recommendation: address power tools, e.g.
ideological discourses, rather than those
producing them (RQ1, RQ2)

7. References
• Bakhtin, M.M. (1981) Discourse in the Novel. In M. Holquist (ed.) The Dialogic Imagination:
Four Essays, University of Texas Press Slavic Series; No. 1. Austin: University of Texas Press,
pp. 259–422.
• Foucault, M. (2003). Society must be defended: Lectures at the College De France 1975–
1976, eds. Mauro Bertani and Alessandro Fontana, trans. David Macey (New York: Picador,
2003), 50.
• Blommaert, J. (2005). Discourse: A Critical Introduction (Key Topics in Sociolinguistics).
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511610295
• Blommaert, J. (2018). Dialogues with ethnography: Notes on classics, and how I read them.
Multilingual Matters.
• Rampton, B., & Eley, L. (2018). Goffman and the everyday interactional grounding of
surveillance. Working Papers in Urban Language & Literacies, 246.

8. Funding
• Ethnography of political activism challenges abuse of power
• Studying diasporic activism can inform governments and civil society
on foreign policy, immigration and asylum questions
• UK is socioculturally diverse and understanding causes of diasporic
communities contributes to cordial coexistence