"Studies have shown that many irregular migrants embark on journeys without accurate or complete information about migration. In response, IOM and other organizations run information campaigns intended to inform potential migrants of the dangers associated with irregular migration and to facilitate
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informed decisions. The use of online and social media platforms for these campaigns has become increasingly popular in recent years, due to their potential for quickly reaching millions of people at low cost. While the evidence base for offline information campaigns has been gradually improving, it remains unclear how online communication campaigns affect potential migrants, and methodologies to do this remain underdeveloped. This report therefore presents results from a pilot impact assessment of an online campaign based on Facebook posts in Guinea, Nigeria and Senegal during September 2019 and February 2020 [.] Conclusion: Facebook ad campaigns can reach many people quickly. However, large audience sizes and relatively cheap costs come with a trade-off. The impact of an information campaign on potential migrants’ perceptions, attitudes, knowledge and behaviour remains largely unknown because many Facebook users that engage with the campaign do not fit the intended target group. The advantage of offline over online campaigns is that implementers have more control and information about who attends activities or who is exposed to campaign content. The engagement of users with campaign posts varies largely by audience and post characteristics. Campaign and social media teams are well advised to conduct pilot tests before scaling up activities. Pilot tests can inform a customized approach for each online activity on Facebook, and thereby maximize impact. In addition to A/B tests, lift tests may offer a useful opportunity to test the impact of Facebook posts. Compared to impact assessments of offline information campaigns, measuring the impact of Facebook ads on potential migrants presents several unique challenges, including: Many potential migrants are not on Facebook or do not use ad content to seek information about migration. Internet connectivity is also limited in many West African countries. While Facebook allows users to narrow down target groups, it is not clear whether those Facebook users that are exposed to the content fit the profile of potential migrants. Whether the intended target group is reached can be affirmed only through surveys, which have a low response rate; It is not possible to interview the same Facebook users several times to track changes in their perceptions. Engagement metrics like post reactions, link clicks or video plays can be useful indicators. However, these low-engagement metrics do not offer clear evidence of the short- or long-term effects on Facebook users." (Executive summary)
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"IOM seeks to provide practical guidance on designing, delivering and evaluating effective communication campaigns relating to migration. The guidance covers different approaches, themes, programme areas and methods to improve relevance, audience participation and results. The aim is to identify and
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navigate the main elements and pitfalls for carrying out a communication campaign within the scope of the Organization’s work. This resource is designed to support IOM staff and migration professionals by providing tools and templates for producing effective and responsive campaigns in unique and challenging migration contexts. The guidance given in this publication is divided into five chapters. Chapter 1 presents a definition of communication campaigns specific to the migration sector, and the background and purpose of these guidelines. Chapter 2 focuses on guiding principles, ethics and related areas, including obtaining informed consent. Chapter 3 addresses campaign design and planning, including analysing the context, defining campaign goals, framing the problem, identifying audiences, setting objectives, designing messaging and assessing the information landscape. Chapter 4 looks at campaign implementation, and also gives examples of some creative IOM communication campaigns. Chapter 5 provides an overview of different approaches to monitoring and evaluation (M&E), demonstrating the tools and methods, including carrying out an impact evaluation." (Introduction)
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"This article aims to investigate the regulatory, financial and political environment negotiated by oppositional Syrian media operating in exile in Turkey, as well as to identify the main tactics used by them in negotiating between these constraints to ensure their survival in an increasingly diffic
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ult environment. As the war in Syria increased in intensity, many oppositional media chose to move their centres of operations into Turkey - forcing them to adapt to a completely foreign regulatory environment, and an unstable political context. Furthermore, and in parallel, their institutional links with the media development sector were being deepened as well. The study draws on in-depth interviews with Syrian media professionals in Turkey, as well as with their interlocutors in international media development organizations. Using Michel de Certeau’s model of strategies and tactics, the study aims at arriving at a better understanding of the complex system of choices made by exilic media organizations to guarantee their survival and achieve their objectives. Within the strategic universes circumscribed by the powerful institutional actors of the Turkish state and the international media development sphere, one can locate the agency of Syrian media actors in their responsive tactical manoeuvrings. The article contends that the tactics employed are also reflective of the identity of these media actors located at the intersection of the alternative, exilic and oppositional." (Abstract)
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"Ein Blick in die Archive zeigt: die Berichterstattung in deutschen Medien über das südliche Afrika während der Apartheid wurde fast zwei Jahrzehnte lang von der südafrikanischen Propaganda gesteuert. Das verstärkte ein koloniales Afrikabild und hat Folgen bis heute." (Seite 12)
"As you have seen in this handbook, the media can have a huge influence on the overall image of migrants and on migration itself, contributing strongly to the formation of a public discourse and opinion-making on this topic and highlighting the most pressing migration challenges or the various benef
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its of migration. As the public tends to inform itself through the media, the impact of the latter on determining the national migration policy of a country has become ever more crucial. The attitude and treatment of migrants by the majority population thus greatly depends on how the media presents them, what issues the media chooses to report on and which ones it omits. The media may either replicate and reinforce existing widespread stereotypes or contribute to a more differentiated and fact-based perception of migrants." (Conclusion)
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"This book provides exemplars of how the Communication discipline and curriculum are responding to the demands of globalization and contributing to the internationalization of higher education. Communication as a discipline provides a strong theoretical and methodological framework for exploring the
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benefits, challenges and meanings of globalization. The goal of this book, therefore, is to facilitate internationalization of the communication discipline in an era of globalization. Section one discusses the theoretical perspectives of globalism, internationalization, and the current state of the Communication discipline and curriculum. Section two offers a comprehensive understanding of the role, ways, and impact of internationalizing teaching, learning, and research in diverse areas of study in Communication, including travel programs and initiatives to bring internationalization to the classroom. The pieces in this section will include research-based articles, case studies, analytical reviews that exam key questions about the field, and themed pieces for dialogue/debate on current and future teaching and learning issues related to internationalizing the Communication discipline/curriculum. Section three provides an extensive sampling of materials and resources for immediate use in internationalization in communication studies; sample syllabi, activities, examples, and readings will be included. In sum, our book is designed to enable communication curriculum and communication courses in other disciplines to be internationalized and to offer different approaches to enable faculty, students, and administrators to incorporate and experience an internationalized curriculum regardless of time and financial limitations." (Publisher description)
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"In 2019, the United States' trade war with China expanded to blacklist the Chinese tech titan Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. The resulting attention showed the information and communications technology (ICT) firm entwined with China's political-economic transformation. But the question remained: why
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does Huawei matter? Yun Wen uses the Huawei story as a microcosm to understand China's evolving digital economy and the global rise of the nation's corporate power. Rejecting the idea of the transnational corporation as a static institution, she explains Huawei's formation and restructuring as a historical process replete with contradictions and complex consequences. She places Huawei within the international political economic framework to capture the dynamics of power structure and social relations underlying corporate China's globalization. As she explores the contradictions of Huawei's development, she also shows the ICT firm's complicated interactions with other political-economic forces. Comprehensive and timely, The Huawei Model offers an essential analysis of China's dynamic development of digital economy and the global technology powerhouse at its core." (Publisher description)
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"Media Imperialism: Continuity and Change advances applied theoretical research on 21st century media imperialism. The volume includes established and emerging researchers in international communications who examine the geopolitical, economic, technological and cultural dimensions of 21st century me
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dia imperialism. The volume highlights and challenges how news, entertainment and social media uphold unequal power relations in the world. Written in an accessible style, this volume marries conceptual, theoretical sophistication, and concrete illustration with rich case studies and global examples. Chapters cover the complete media spectrum, from social media to Hollywood, to news and national propaganda in national and transnational analyses. Readers will find discussions that range from soft power and China to the USA's empire of the internet to the rise of "Chindia" in a post-American media world." (Publisher description)
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"China is making a sustained effort to become a ‘cyber superpower’. An integral part of this effort is the propagation by Beijing of the notion of ‘internet sovereignty’ – China’s supreme right to govern the internet within its borders and keep it under rigid control. Chinese companies w
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ork closely with Chinese state authorities to export technology to Africa in order to extend China’s influence and promote its cyberspace governance model. This contribution argues that the rapid expansion across Africa of Chinese technology companies and their products warrants vigilance. If African governments fail to advance their own values and interests – including freedom of expression, free enterprise and the rule of law – with equal boldness, the ‘China model’ of digital governance by default might very well become the ‘Africa model’." (Abstract)
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"The mediation of migration as a crisis has worked to shore up various forms of militarized surveillance, humanitarian response, legislative action, and affective investment. Bridging academic inquiry and artistic and activist practice, the essays, documents, and artworks gathered in Moving Images i
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nterrogate the mediation of migration and refugeeism in the contemporary European conjuncture, asking how images, discourses, and data are involved in shaping the visions and experience of migration in increasingly global contexts." (Publisher description)
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"Russia has operationalized the concept of perpetual adversarial competition in the information environment by encouraging the development of a disinformation and propaganda ecosystem that allows for varied and overlapping approaches that reinforce each other even when individual messages within the
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system appear contradictory. This ecosystem reflects both the sources of disinformation and propaganda—official government statements, state-funded media outlets, proxy websites, bots, false social media personas, cyber-enabled disinformation operations, etc.—and the different tactics that these channels use. Russia’s willingness to employ this approach provides it with three perceived advantages. First, it allows for the introduction of numerous variations of the same false narratives. This allows for the different pillars of the ecosystem to fine tune their disinformation narratives to suit different target audiences because there is no need for consistency, as there would be with attributed government communications. Second, it provides plausible deniability for Kremlin officials when proxy sites peddle blatant and dangerous disinformation, allowing them to deflect criticism while still introducing pernicious information. Third, it creates a media multiplier effect among the different pillars of the ecosystem that boost their reach and resonance. The media multiplier effect can, at times, create disinformation storms with potentially dangerous effects for those Russia perceives as adversaries at the international, national, and local level. In the past, Russia has leveraged this dynamic to shield itself from criticism for its involvement in malign activity. This approach also allows Russia to be opportunistic, such as with COVID-19, where it has used the global pandemic as a hook to push longstanding disinformation and propaganda narratives [...] This report provides a visual representation of the ecosystem described above, as well as an example of the media multiplier effect it enables. This serves to demonstrate how the different pillars of the ecosystem play distinct roles and feed off of and bolster each other. The report also includes brief profiles of select proxy sites and organizations that occupy an intermediate role between the pillars of the ecosystem with clear links to Russia and those that are meant to be fully deniable." (Pages 5-7)
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"Due to its Soviet past, the Russian influence in the Republic of Moldova is still very significant. The country is divided between European integration and Russian convergence. After the government of the pro-European coalition ACUM leaded by Maia Sandu and the pro-Russian Party of Socialists (PSRM
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) of President Igor Dodon fell apart in November 2019, pro-Russian powers under the leadership of Dodon are expanding its power progressively. This affects the media market, which already has experienced an enormous state concentration under the long-time government of the Democratic Party and its leader Vladimir Plahotniuc." (Page 1)
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"The Chinese state has demonstrated a propensity for controlling and shaping the information environment of the Chinese diaspora—including via WeChat. The meteoric growth of TikTok has now put the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in a position from which it can shape the information environment on a
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largely non-Chinese-speaking platform—with the help of the highest valued start-up in the world and its opaque advanced AI-powered algorithm. Chinese party-state leverage over these companies is considerable, is exercised internally via CCP committees and is enforced by a suite of cybersecurity and intelligence laws. As Chinese companies, Tencent and ByteDance are not only required to participate in intelligence work, but they’re also legally mandated to promote CCP propaganda. China’s censorship and propaganda apparatus is a responsibility that’s pushed down to media and technology companies such as Tencent and ByteDance. As Chinese companies, they’re obligated to comply with strict government regulations on what content is allowed to be published on their platforms, and they both invest heavily in automated systems for content filtering and human curation. The demands of the PRC’s surveillance and propaganda apparatus on these technology companies are such that, at least in the case of WeChat, they’re even prepared to surveil the foreign users of their apps in order to better train the censorship algorithms used on Chinese citizens within the PRC." (Conclusion, page 47)
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"Beijing is running an extensive and sophisticated long-term outreach campaign which cuts across the developed and developing world, focusing on both legacy and digital media. This is a strategic, long-term effort to reshape the global news landscape with a China-friendly global narrative. Through f
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oreign media acquisitions and large-scale telecommunications ventures, China is increasing its share in critical information infrastructure overseas. In this way, Beijing is moving to build control over the messaging infrastructure, as well as subsidising the messaging through content-sharing and reprogramming the messagers through training schemes. Through journalism tours and education, Beijing is cultivating a cadre of third-party supporters, outsourcing its influence operations to individual journalists. There is a more pronounced focus on journalists from developing countries with repressive and ineffective governments. To this end, Beijing is also leveraging global journalism bodies to serve its ends, contracting cooptation through MOUs, a classic United Front strategy. One corollary of the journalism exchanges is the exportation of a different model of journalism than that practiced in the West. China is offering concrete aid in the form of technical support, equipment and training to journalism organisations depending on need. The perception towards China’s outreach is generally positive. Beijing’s key objective is boosting coverage overseas that aligns with its policy priorities, in particular gaining favourable media for its Belt and Road Initiative and deflecting attention from the 1 million Uighurs in political indoctrination camps in Xinjiang. China’s overall strategic objectives are the same across the board, but its ability to achieve these goals is dependent upon the responsiveness of respective governments and the media’s commitment to a free press." (Conclusion)
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"Our analysis shows that the mediated debates about migration in Western and Eastern Europe are more differentiated, and less stereotypical, as often assumed. Indeed, coverage in media outlets in Western Europe feature more positive aspects and speakers compared to the outlets in Central and Eastern
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Europe. However, even in Hungary and Poland – two countries marked by very problematic developments in media policy – the outlets involved in the study offer a complex picture. The migration-critical stance of outlets closely related to the government is contrasted by the complex coverage of independent outlets. The case of Magyar HÃrlap may serve as an illustrative example how outlets close to the government – in this case the massive anti-migration campaign of Prime Minister Orbán – ignore professional norms. Indeed, Magyar HÃrlap did not include a single migrant or refugee in the total of 301 articles it has published in the study period. The study identifies professional challenges for outlets in other countries. Similar to previous studies, this study shows that migrants and refugees are mostly covered as a large, anonymous group. Rarely are they identified as individuals, and rarely do they speak for themselves. But our study also shows that the majority of articles only vaguely at best indicate context and origin countries of migrants. Neither do they make a clear distinction between refugees with protected status and migrants. Certainly, this remains a challenge, given editorial constraints and incomplete information in everyday practice. However, journalists should strive to make use of the correct definitions especially in countries where governments deliberately use incorrect labels. Taking the very low share of background articles into account as well, media users across Europe may find it hard to come to their own informed conclusions on migrants and refugees." (Discussion, page 48)
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"China’s efforts to use state media as a means to increase its soft power around the world have raised concerns in many quarters. With much fanfare in late 2016, China relaunched its global television network, formerly known as China Central Television, as a new global media brand, the China Globa
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l Television Network (CGTN). Despite extensive investment and active support from the highest levels of government, including President Xi Jinping, CGTN has had limited success in improving China’s international soft power standing. For many Western observers, it is CGTN’s association with the Chinese party-state which limits its ability to shape and influence the global discourse. However, it is CGTN’s internal organisational structure and culture which really inhibits its effectiveness as a soft power tool." (Abstract)
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"Auf der ganzen Welt nutzen unterschiedlichste Akteure die Wirkungsmechanismen der digitalen Medien aus, um durch gezielte Desinformationskampagnen die öffentliche Meinung zu beeinflussen. Dies, so lautet die zentrale These von Peter Pomerantsev, bedrohe Demokratien und Demokratisierungsprozesse. W
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o früher Informationen durch die Zensur kontrolliert wurden, gebe es heute ein Überangebot an Informationen, deren Wahrheitsgehalt immer schwerer feststellbar ist. Dadurch ginge das Vertrauen in eine gemeinsam gelebte und objektiv überprüfbare Wirklichkeit als Voraussetzung öffentlicher Meinungs- und Willensbildung zunehmend verloren. Autokratische Regime hätten es so leichter, Narrative zu verbreiten, die das Ziel haben, politische Gegner zu schwächen, missliebige Journalistinnen und Journalisten zu diskreditieren oder zivilgesellschaftliche Organisationen zu delegitimieren. Kriege wie der in der Ostukraine würden heutzutage nicht durch Schusswaffen, sondern durch Troll-Armeen, Cybermilizen und Facebook-Posts entschieden. Auf seinen Reisen taucht Pomerantsev in die grenzenlose Welt der Internetaktivistinnen und -aktivisten ein und zeigt die lokalen Folgen davon auf, wenn sie Kategorien wie Wahrheit und Lüge ins Wanken bringen." (Klappentext)
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