"In this chapter we begin by surveying the digital political landscape, which has provided a fertile breeding ground for trolling as a state tool for suppression of dissenting ideas. We observe the tactical move by states from an ideology of information scarcity to one of information abundance, whic
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h sees "speech itself as a censorial weapon" (Wu 2017). This era of information abundance has enabled states to sponsor and execute trolling attacks using ordinary internet users as well as volunteer, amateur and professional trolling institutions. Under the heading "The Anatomy of Patriotic Trolling," we outline salient patterns from more than 15 case studies across seven countries illustrating the common tools and tactics in state-sponsored trolling attacks. Drawing on campaigns across Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Ecuador, the Philippines, Turkey, Venezuela and the United States, we are able to establish the existence of a broader trend within which national variations occur. We then offer a framework for conceptualizing the responsibility of states for such attacks. We argue attribution is critical to elucidating remedies to state-sponsored trolling. As long as the role of governments in instigating or leveraging such campaigns is obscured, it will be impossible to advance effective technological or regulatory solutions. We conclude by offering some preliminary policy proposals, hoping this chapter will prompt a further debate about effective and necessary interventions." (Pages 503-504)
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"The book includes an extensive section on the echoes of Rwanda, which looks at the cases of Darfur, the Central African Republic, Myanmar, and South Sudan, while the impact of social media as a new actor is examined through chapters on social media use by the Islamic State and in Syria and in other
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contexts across the developing world. It also looks at the aftermath of the genocide: the shifting narrative of the genocide itself, the evolving debate over the role and impact of hate media in Rwanda, the challenge of digitizing archival records of the genocide, and the fostering of free and independent media in atrocity's wake. The volume also probes how journalists themselves confront mass atrocity and examines the preventive function of media through the use of advanced digital technology as well as radio programming in the Lake Chad Basin and the Democratic Republic of Congo." (Publisher description)
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