Kumulative Dissertation, Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg, 2017

This thesis investigates the role of technology in the collective dynamics of digitally enabled social networks. Based on a review of the historical foundation of research on crowds, collective behaviour, and collective dynamics in the social sciences and in research on complex systems, it develops a conceptualisation of collective dynamics in the context of digitally enabled social networks. This conceptualisation provides the foundation for one overarching and three subordinate research questions dedicated to different aspects of the role technology plays in understanding and managing the collective dynamics of digitally enabled social networks. The body of work comprising this dissertation is distributed across fifteen papers that contribute to these research questions.