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The Unfreedom Monitor: Russia Country Report

Amsterdam: Global Voices Advox (2022), 28 pp.

"The internet gained centrality as a space of public opinion and political activity that became important for the Russian state to co-opt and control as part of the broader push for control of political elites and public perceptions as Putin and his ruling party pushed to eliminate any functioning o ... more

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The Unfreedom Monitor: Turkey Country Report

Amsterdam: Global Voices Advox (2022), 27 pp.

"Since its ascent to power twenty years ago, the ruling AKP has tightened the screws on all forms of freedom of expression, both online and offline. It has introduced draconian laws, imposed internet restrictions, blocked content, and has arrested and intimidated critics on an unprecedented level. I ... more

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The Unfreedom Monitor: Sudan Country Report

Khattab Hamad

Amsterdam: Global Voices Advox (2022), 25 pp.

"There is a clear digital divide in Sudan as the number of internet users is a very low part of the population. Despite the high contribution of the telecommunication field to the GDP, the Sudanese authorities are not using this contribution to enhance and develop the ICT field to fill the gap of di ... more

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The Unfreedom Monitor: Zimbabwe Country Report

Kudzai Chimhangwa

Amsterdam: Global Voices Advox (2022), 28 pp.

"The government of Zimbabwe and the ruling ZANU PF party are bent on ensuring that the status quo is preserved at all costs. As evidenced by findings in the Civic Media Observatory, the digital sphere has been identified as a threat to the country’s national security, insofar as deposing the curre ... more

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The Informational Dictator's Dilemma: Citizen Responses to Media Censorship and Control in Russia and Belarus

Samuel A. Greene

PONARS Eurasia (2022), 9 pp.

"The findings described in this memo strongly suggest that "softer" strategies of media cooptation are more effective than harsher, more coercive approaches to media control. In Russia, where the Kremlin has-until very recently-used a combination of commercial pressure and political influence to pus ... more

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Media and Democratic Backsliding: Lessons from the Turkish Case

Eylem Yanardagoglu

Athens; Berlin: Hellenic Foundation for European & Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP); Centre for Applied Turkey Studies (CATS) (2022), 7 pp.

"In Turkey, the AKP came to power in 2002 at a time marked by a relatively pro-European Union and pluralistic outlook in politics. The democratic backsliding in Turkey has been more obvious since 2007 and the start of the AKP’s second term in power. It deepened especially after the 2016 coup attem ... more

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Is Telegram a “harbinger of Freedom”? The Performance, Practices, and Perception of Platforms as Political Actors in Authoritarian States

Mariëlle Wijermars, Tetyana Lokot

Post-Soviet Affairs, volume 38, issue 1-2 (2022), pp. 125-145

"This paper examines the practices, performance, and perceptions of the messaging platform Telegram as an actor in the 2020 Belarus protests, using publicly available data from Telegram’s public statements, protest-related Telegram groups, and media coverage. Developing a novel conceptualization o ... more

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Russia's Vigilante YouTube Stars: Digital Entrepreneurship and Heroic Masculinity in the Service of Flexible Authoritarianism

Anna Schwenck

Europe-Asia Studies, volume 74, issue 7 (2022), pp. 1166-1189

"Combating illegal parking and drinking in public is the raison d’être of Russia’s best-known law-and-order youth initiatives, StopKham and Lev Protiv. These initiatives enforce and promote neotraditional morals amongst young people by challenging alleged offenders on camera and uploading the e ... more

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Russische Medien in Deutschland. Die Bundestagswahlen 2021 – Zwischen Einflussnahme und Desinformation

Susanne Spahn

Potsdam: Friedrich Naumann Stiftung (2022), 29 pp.

"Während in Russland immer mehr unabhängige Medien der staatlichen Kontrolle unterworfen und als „ausländische Agenten“ gebrandmarkt werden, nutzen die russischen Staatsmedien die Meinungs- und Pressefreiheit in Deutschland, um ungehindert Desinformation zu verbreiten. Nach acht Jahren Berich ... more

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Russlands unabhängiger Journalismus: Der harte Überlebenskampf unter totalitären Repressionsmaßnahmen

Sergej Parkhomenko

Potsdam: Friedrich Naumann Stiftung (2022), 39 pp.

"Der Journalist und Verleger Sergej Parkhomenko ist ein international gefeierter Menschenrechtsverteidiger, Oppositionsaktivist und unter den russischen Medienschaffenden einer der wichtigsten Partner für das Internationale Journalisten- und Mediendialogprogramm (IJMD) der Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftun ... more

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Winning the Web: How Beijing Exploits Search Results to Shape Views of Xinjiang and COVID-19

Jessica Brandt, Bret Schafer, Elen Aghekyan, Valerie Wirtschafter, Adya Danaditya

Washington, DC: Brookings Institution (2022), 47 pp.

"For months, our team has been tracking how China has exploited search engine results on Xinjiang and COVID-19, two subjects that are geopolitically salient to Beijing — Xinjiang, because the Chinese government seeks to push back on condemnation of its rights record; COVID-19, because it seeks to ... more

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Information Bedlam: Russian and Chinese Information Operations During Covid-19

Edward Lucas, Jake Morris, Corina Rebegea

Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) (2021), 20 pp.

"Based on a literature review through January 2021, evaluated at an expert seminar, this policy brief provides a baseline analysis of changing tactics, narratives, and distribution strategies in Russian and Chinese information operations (IOs) relating to the covid-19 pandemic. Key findings: China c ... more

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Cyber Capabilities as a New Resource of Power Conflicts in the Digital Sphere

Jason Chumtong, Christina Stolte

International Reports (Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung), issue 1 (2021), pp. 95-105

"Interestingly, traditional sources of power, such as military and economic strength, are not a prerequisite for success in cyberspace. It is true that the premier league of cyber powers also includes many traditional major powers in its ranks. But states need very few resources to build their cyber ... capabilities and exploit them to project influence, as the examples of international outsiders like Iran and Venezuela demonstrate. In some ways, cyber capabilities even seem ideally suited to allowing small and medium-sized countries to increase their influence because they represent an effective tool of asymmetric warfare. Even though they require relatively few resources and low-threshold technology, they have the potential to inflict considerable damage when deployed against other countries Attacks on poorly protected public authorities, businesses, or even infrastructure can cause serious damage to other countries. The risks for the attacker are reasonably low because attribution of the attacks is usually difficult and time-consuming. On top of this, the evidence is seldom clear, and consistent denial of any involvement is part and parcel of cyber warfare. This is also one of the key differences from previous power struggles at the international level. While the global battle for power and influence has always been accompanied by visible demonstrations of power and the accumulation of status symbols, the struggle in cyberspace takes place under the radar. This makes it especially difficult to identify shifts of power occurring today. Particularly in the field of information warfare, an area of growing importance in both national and international conflicts, states that were never previously on the radar as global players are now increasing their international influence. Yet, these countries recognised the potential of digital technologies at an early stage and are exploiting them with great success. Many of them have a wealth of experience in this respect due to having deployed the tools of information warfare against their own citizens and political opponents for many years. They can now direct this expertise towards other countries to wield global influence." (Conclusion, page 103) more

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The Great Firewall of China: How to Build and Control an Alternative Version of the Internet

James Griffiths

London: Zed Books (2021), xv, 423 pp.

"China's 'Great Firewall' has evolved into the most sophisticated system of online censorship in the world. As the Chinese internet grows and online businesses thrive, speech is controlled, dissent quashed, and attempts to organise outside the official Communist Party are quickly stamped out. Update ... more

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Democracy and Fake News

Serena Giusti, Elisa Piras (eds.)

London; New York: Routledge (2021), xiv, 232 pp.

"This book explores the challenges that disinformation, fake news, and post-truth politics pose to democracy from a multidisciplinary perspective. The authors analyse and interpret how the use of technology and social media as well as the emergence of new political narratives has been progressively ... more

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Cyber Capabilities and National Power: A Net Assessment

London et al.: International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) (2021), 174 pp.

"This report sets out a new methodology for assessing cyber power, and then applies it to 15 states: Four members of the Five Eyes intelligence alliance – the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia; Three cyber-capable allies of the Five Eyes states – France, Israel and Japan; F ... more

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Censorship, the Media, and the Market in China

Jonathan Hassid

Journal of Chinese Political Science, volume 25 (2020), pp. 285–309

"Pervasive media censorship in China is often seen as a strictly political issue. Although in past years reporters have had leeway to report on economic issues, the Chinese Party/state has moved to tamp down economic journalism, even arresting those who report on bad economic news. This shift brings ... more

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Das ist keine Propaganda: Wie unsere Wirklichkeit zertrümmert wird

Peter Pomerantsev

Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (bpb), Sonderausg. (2020), 295 pp.

"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 ... more

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From repression to oppression: News journalism in Turkey 2013–2018

Stefanie Pukallus, Lisa Bradley, Sarah Clarke, Jackie Harrison

Media, Culture & Society, volume 42, issue 7-8 (2020), pp. 1443-1460

"The political context for practicing free and independent journalism has always been challenging in Turkey and ever more so after the failed coup d’état of 2016. This article examines and analyzes the changes brought about by this failed coup d’état in terms of their civil, legal, and politic ... more

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Decentralization of Political Design in China

Jonathan Benney

Pacific Affairs: an International Review of Asia and the Pacific, volume 93, issue 4 (2020), pp. 709-734

"Political posters, banners, and similar objects are extremely common in China. This article uses political design from contemporary China, particularly emphasising the government’s Chinese Dream campaign, to analyze what at first appears to be a paradox. The subjects of the campaigns and the lang ... more