Flexible patterns of organizing, temporary coalitions and loose activist networks are considered as defining features of current collective action. Digital communication technologies play an integral role in such patterns of organizing, highlighting the close relationship between collective action and communication. Yet, dominated by a view of mediated communication as a process that occurs in public, and thus externally from the collective, social movement theory tends to be lacking the conceptual tools that would aid in exploring the links between digital technologies and the internal organizing practices of social movements. Building on recent theories that map the role of communication within the constitution of collective action (see, for instance, Flanagin, Stohl and Bimber 2006), this paper aims to conceptualize the role of communication in different aspects of internal organizing. To achieve this, it draws from organizational theory and particularly from the work of McPhee and Zaug who argue that an organization is constituted by four flows of communication: the first links the organization with its members (membership negotiation), the second connects the organization with itself in a reflexive way (self-structuring), the third links it with its environment (institutional positioning), while the fourth occurs in members’ activity around specific work situations (activity coordination). The paper then attempts to link the four communication flows with central concerns within social movement theory, such as organizational structures, identification processes, interpersonal ties, as well as decision-making and governance mechanisms. The media used by the movement shape these communication flows in various ways as they affect the mode of communication, its interactivity and its participants. Offered as a tentative framework that links organizational with communication and social movement theory, this conceptualization can aid us in investigating how digital communication practices are associated with the looser forms of organizing observed in current collective action.
