Certainly not new IMO social movements taking on the state / government, modern IT is clearly an enabler and a vulnerability. Communication is simply faster.

So I spotted this comment on ICSR's blog, entitled 'No matter what he says, Wael Ghonim is a leader: Social Movement Leadership...'

It open with:
There has been a steady stream of thought-provoking remarks about the role of leadership (or lack thereof) in the activist movements that coordinated via social network sites to overthrow the Mubarak regime in Egypt. Most recently, Clint Watts wrote a thoughtful post on the subject at his blog, Selected Wisdom. His comments were sparked by a Steve Inskeep interview with Wael Ghonim, the Egyptian activist and Google executive who played a significant role in the uprising. The occasion of the interview was the release of Ghonim’s new book, Revolution 2.0, which I blogged briefly about the other day.
Link:http://icsr.info/blog/No-matter-what...ian-Revolution