New media technologies have transformed environmental campaigns and activism in China. The social media affords both Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and local protester communities the opportunity to embrace the dynamics of environmental movements in the digital age, when flexible networks of communications among stakeholders are necessary and encouraged. The use of social media is these days redefining power arrangements and capital accumulation in China’s environmental movements. Environmental NGOs and local communities use different tactics to work using what the social media affords.

In this thesis I explore environmental movements in China’s digital age. First, I critically assess how the social media is used differently by environmental NGOs and the loosely self-organised field of local environmental protester communities. By analysing 76 in-depth interviews with stakeholders, seven cases of localised small-scale protests, and three large-scale Anti-PX Protest Movements, I evaluate how the use of social media is shaping China’s environmental movements. Although analysing social media offers insights for understanding China’s environmental movements, it is not enough to attribute to new media technologies the ultimate influence on the logics of the local-communities-field and the environmental-NGOs-field. Rather, taking account of a 9-month internship in two environmental NGOs and subsequent empirical analysis, I provide insights into the ways that environmental NGOs, protester communities, the government, and traditional media journalists interact with the social media, and accordingly how different forms of capital are exchanged. Drawing upon a field approach, inspired by sociologist Pierre Bourdieu, I build the empirical investigation and extend the field theory in understanding social media and social movement research. The lessons learned have led me to propose a new form of capital: public capital. The findings of my research reveal how different forms of capital – including cultural, social, symbolic, economic, and now ‘public – environmental NGOs and local communities possess are changing in relation to social media affordances and use. Among the findings is that the use of social media has brought stakeholders of the environmental movement field a variety of chances and challenges to act and communicate with each other; the use of social media strengthens interactions among environmental NGOs and local communities; the social media has helped to expand the networks of environmental NGOs and activist communities; and the social media has blurred distinctions between NGOs and local community actions, albeit in limited ways. In a digital age of social media, environmental NGOs and protester groups not only shared resources; they were also able to take risks together. With the use of social media, environmental NGOs could secretly become involved in street activism, while local protesters learned alternative ways of public interest litigation to sue the polluters. However, the study reveals that face-to-face personal networks and traditional mass communication are still at the core of China’s contemporary environmental movements. Possible explanations for this include a huge digital divide, censorship and surveillance, and a lack of sufficient funds and qualified personnel among NGOs. The results reconsider how uncertainties, censorship, and the risks of surveillance and personal danger complicate any use of the social media for social movements.