Isn't that exactly one of the interesting tensions here?

You original point is that at a macro level it's driven by the elite decision makers not technology. I think the point you are perhaps missing is how much of that is constrained by the distribution of power and how technology can change that distribution.

I think there is no doubt that access to the internet and information ( and propaganda ) , and self-organised mass communication has had an impact - that's why countries switch off the internet when trying to suppress an uprising for example.

A lot of previously stable countries are starting to feel 'ungovernable' in the sense that's it's increasingly difficult for the established order to create and maintain it's preferred narrative.

If you look back in history at the last big information revolution - the printing press - the consensus is that it played a significant role in things like the French or American revolution or the breaking the power of centralised religion.

And sure those in power are scrambling to put the genie back in the bottle, and they may succeed - but that just illustrates the potential transformative power.

Wasn't the whole Arab Spring in 2011 due, in a large part, to technology/twitter/mass-communication and organization enabled by the internet?

Maybe I am misremembering it.

That example alone feels enough.