Mobile Phones, Collective Action, and Social Capital

In my last post, I mentioned ownership and use of cell phones as a means for examining social capital. According to the World Bank study I cited, the idea was that rural areas with high cell phone ownership would produce a type of social network facilitating communication. I thought of tagging a study in the APSR which also used mobile phone onto the previous post, but decided it was worth creating a new post.
In the May 2013 issue of APSR, Jan Pierskalla and Florian Hollenbach find that:

The availability of cell phones as a communication technology allows political groups to overcome collective action problems more easily and improve in-group cooperation, and coordination. Utilizing novel, spatially disaggregated data on cell phone coverage and the location of organized violent events in Africa, we are able to show that the availability of cell phone coverage significantly and substantially increases the probability of violent conflict.

The authors argue that cell phones helps facilitate in-group organization and the coordination of insurgent attacks. Hence cell phone coverage should be correlated with increased political violence. I haven't read the entire article, but their insights provide a counterpoint to many of the positive stories attached to technology, social media, and mobilization (i.e. Arab Spring, Occupy Movements, Candlelight Vigils in South Korea). It also takes us back to basic questions about social capital and what it's used for. Does social capital have to promote larger social (and not just private) benefits? The classic example are mafia groups and organized crime. Lots of social capital in those organizations. But towards what purpose?