"All over the world, satirists courageously stand up for democratic values, often under extremely difficult conditions. Through their art, they create spaces for freedom and challenge authorities. On the other hand, extremists use humour for their political purposes too: They ridicule those who diss
...
ent and make fun of democratic values. It is not helpful that political debates are increasingly taking place in digital spaces that lack transparency and fair rules." (Publisher description)
more
"Affective polarization has been a persistent feature of Afghanistan’s society and politics in the past decades. However, with the instantaneous collapse of the republic’s government and the return of the Taliban, the country has witnessed heightened affective polarization along ethnic and ideol
...
ogical lines. Stemming from deep-rooted historical grievances, aggregated conflicts, and over a century of failed struggles for statebuilding and nation-building in Afghanistan, the surge in affective polarization is intricately linked with the elite’s behaviour and social media use. Outbidding strategies by elites result in more extreme positions. Coupled with the dissemination of hate and harmful messages, and divisive online content, this attracts wider attention and social support against a background of dwindling inter-group trust, state failure, and uncertainty over the political prospects. This article attempts to conceptualize the complex causal relations of affective polarization, elite behaviour, and social media platforms in Afghanistan’s fragmented social and political landscape." (Abstract)
more
"Zimbabwe has a tainted media history under Mugabe replete with examples of state orchestrated repression, draconian legislation, harassment of journalists and violation of their work premises. The post-November 2017 coup period is a critical reference point to understand the political economy of al
...
ternative media under the so-called ‘New Dispensation’ of President Mnangagwa with its promises of prodemocracy reforms. Using political economy as a theoretical approach that analyses media systems in a holistic manner by linking them to politics, economy, legislation and technology, this study assesses the extent to which the ‘New Dispensation’ has implemented political economy reforms that impact alternative media. Drawing from interviews with selected alternative media journalists and proprietors, the findings reveal that alternative media in Zimbabwe remain entrenched in repression and are in a crisis caused by an exacerbation of the same structural factors that existed before. The ‘New Dispensation’ has instead led to the entrenchment of a new dictatorship by the military junta. Undue political interference, a fragile economy and state orchestrated repression continue to constrain the democratic functions of alternative media. By teasing the continuities and discontinuities of alternative media repression during the Mugabe era and under the ‘New Dispensation’, the paper contributes to ongoing debates about the consequence of the 2017 coup and the need for genuine democratic reforms in Zimbabwe post-Mugabe epoch." (Abstract)
more
"En septembre 2022, suite à l'assassinat d'une jeune fille kurde iranienne par les patrouilles d'orientation, l'Iran connaît des mois de soulèvements contre le régimeSi ces derniers adoptent de nouvelles formes de contestation, ils sont causés par les mêmes injustices que les précédents mouv
...
ements sociaux dans le paysCes formes nouvelles ont eu un écho médiatique sans précédent dans le monde.Ce travail de recherche tente de comprendre et d'analyser comment la presse française a couvert ces soulèvementsIl s'interroge sur le cadrage médiatique qui en a été fait afin de déterminer dans quelle mesure cette couverture reflète les préoccupations de l'espace public français et comment elle participe à la construction d'une réalité journalistique." (Description de la maison d'édition)
more
"From US President Donald Trump’s Tweet labeling news media “the enemy of the people” to Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s establishment of a politically appointed Media Authority, media freedom is under threat in democracies and nondemocracies alike. According to Freedom House, in 20
...
16 media freedom declined globally to its lowest level since 2003, with Europe experiencing the largest regional decrease. We investigate the relationship between government and media in Hungary and Poland and develop a theory that the rise of nationalist sentiment and leaders who leverage this sentiment to encourage censorship from the bottom-up has led to increased media restrictions from the top-down. We posit that bottom-up censorship will erode media credibility and make people more accepting of top-down media restrictions, which could, in turn, lead to nationalism unchecked by the fourth estate. Using a multilevel analysis of World Values Survey, we analyze the relationship between nationalism and media distrust. Using a cross-national time series, we analyze the relationship between nationalist sentiment and media restrictions. We find that increased nationalism is indeed associated with media distrust and media restrictions." (Abstract)
more
"Most scholars focus on the prevalence and democratic effects of (partisan) news exposure. This focus misses large parts of online activities of a majority of politically disinterested citizens. Although political content also appears outside of news outlets and may profoundly shape public opinion,
...
its prevalence and effects are understudied at scale. This project combines three-wave panel survey data from three countries (total N = 7,266) with online behavioral data from the same participants (over 106M visits). We create a multi-lingual classifier to identify political content both in news and outside (e.g. in shopping or entertainment sites). We find that news consumption is infrequent: just 3.4% of participants’ online browsing comprised visits to news sites. Only between 14% (NL) and 36% (US) of these visits were to news about politics. The overwhelming majority of participants' visits were to non-news sites. Although only 1.6% of those visits related to politics, in absolute terms, citizens encounter politics more frequently outside of news than within news. Out of every 10 visits to political content, 3.4 come from news and 6.6 from non-news sites. Furthermore, exposure to political content outside news domains had the same – and in some cases stronger - associations with key democratic attitudes and behaviors as news exposure. These findings offer a comprehensive analysis of the online political (not solely news) ecosystem and demonstrate the importance of assessing the prevalence and effects of political content in non-news sources." (Abstract)
more
"This study examines #WhatsHappeningInMyanmar and attempts to understand the practice of hashtags in the struggle against digital repression. By using descriptive analysis methods and qualitative content analysis, this study argues that #WhatsHappeningInMyanmar is categorized into 4 distinct narrati
...
ve forms: Grievance expression, information dissemination, attracting support, and mobilization. Each narrative fulfills different functions within the context of the struggle against digital repression. Grievance expression challenges social manipulation and disinformation. Information dissemination tackles censorship and social manipulation/disinformation. Attracting support helps keep the conversation about Myanmar active on social media even when the Internet is shut down. Finally, the mobilization narrative helps protect protesters and online users from state surveillance and persecution. Through analyzing the hashtag narrative, this study offers resourceful findings on how activists have used social media against digital repression and on the evolution of resistance to struggle against new types of state repression." (Abstract)
more
"The COVID-19 pandemic has uncovered prejudices, systemic inequities and critical feelings about governmental institutions around the globe. Since the start of the pandemic, the 12 nations that make up South America have had more than 67 million cases and 1.3 million fatalities. Public trust in and
...
willingness to speak out about government responses to COVID-19 in each nation have differed vastly. Using spiral of silence, this study (n =1248) explored support for governmental COVID-19 response and willingness to speak out about that response in four South American nations: Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Peru. Results revealed Chileans are more likely to speak out on government response to COVID-19 than other South American participants. In addition, climate of opinion and support for government response positively predict willingness to speak. These results further our international and cross-cultural understanding of spiral of silence." (Abstract)
more
"[...] this paper presents approximately 30 worldwide examples of successful AI use to promote various aspects of democracy. At the same time, the corresponding challenges that need to be addressed are highlighted. From the examination of international examples, the following theses can be derived:
...
AI systems can promote all aspects of democracy in a similar way; the use of AI systems for democracy requires the functioning of democratic structures; focus not only on generative AI: significant advantages can also come from processing and identifying AI systems; AI systems that promote democracy must be particularly comprehensible and transparent; AI systems facilitate participation but do not enable it; AI systems can make large amounts of data usable—for both citizens and the state; AI must be considered in the context of existing digitalization processes; not everything that AI systems can do is desired in a democracy." (Executive summary)
more
"This report examines political communication and media trust in the age of generative artificial intelligence systems (AI). Firstly, it provides a brief explainer of generative AI tools and techniques, looking separately at systems that generate text and those that generate or manipulate images, vi
...
deos and audio. By reference to real-world examples, the paper then surveys the ways in which generative AI systems have recently been used by political actors, distinguishing between three different use-cases: political campaigning, entertainment and disinformation campaigns. Building on this empirical analysis, the paper distils important insights for policymakers, which highlight the need to: refrain from falsely labelling content as AI-generated to avoid overstating the technical capabilities and persuasive power of those spreading disinformation; acknowledge the multimodality of threats posed by generative AI, in particular voice-generation; delimit fair-use cases of generative AI for political campaigning, given these technologies are already widely used for legitimate political communication purposes; raise awareness of how seemingly non-political uses of generative AI can be exploited for politics, in particular the creation of non-consensual intimate content. This is followed by an evaluation of emerging technical and policy solutions, namely the detection and labelling of deepfakes as well as the development of systems to certify content authenticity and provenance. The section concludes with a discussion of the emerging legal landscape, including the European Union’s AI Act." (Executive summary)
more
"Drawing on a broad range of case studies across the continent, the volume considers what constitutes communication rights in Africa, who should protect them, against whom, and how communication rights relate to broader human rights. While the case studies highlight the variation in communicative ri
...
ghts experiences between countries, they also coalesce around common tropes and practices for the implementation and expression of communication rights. Deploying a variety of innovative theoretical and methodological approaches, the chapters scrutinise different facets of communication rights in the context of both offline and digital communication realities. The contributions provide illuminating accounts on language rights, digital exclusion, digital activism, citizen journalism, media regulation and censorship, protection of intellectual property rights, politics of mobile data, and politicisation of social media." (Publisher description)
more
"Visuals hold a special place in the field of communication. Politicians, in a move to position themselves or market their activities, use visuals that stand as a testimony to their principles. However, their importance and value in political communication are not highly reflected in academic litera
...
ture. This article is built from this understudied field by looking at the role photojournalists play in framing opposition political parties in Zimbabwe. Photographs are important tools in politics as evidenced by experimental research on political communication that found that ‘a single photograph can have a clear impact on voters’ judgements regarding a candidate’s demeanour, competence, leadership ability, attractiveness, likeableness, and integrity’. This study seeks to analyse photographs that were used by photojournalists to frame the newly formed political party, amidst the power struggles within the party, and political repression from the authoritarian regime. Informed by visual framing, the study found that photojournalists framed Nelson Chamisa as youthful and vibrant while his party was seen as resembling the new dawn. However, photographs also showed that Chamisa and his party had nothing to offer as they did not have a constitution, guiding policy nor a clear ideology." (Abstract)
more
"Saad Mohseni, chairman and CEO of Moby Group, Afghanistan's largest media company, charts a twenty-year effort to bring a free press to his country after years of Taliban rule, and how that effort persists even after the Taliban's return to power in 2021. In the heady early days of the American occ
...
upation, Mohseni returns to Kabul which he had last seen as a child before the Soviet invasion. Casting about for ways to be involved in the dawn of a new Afghanistan, Mohseni makes what seems like a quixotic decision to leave the comforts of a career in international banking to start a Kabul radio station with his three siblings. This unlikely venture quickly blossoms into a burgeoning television empire, bringing Mohseni and his family and employees into sometimes uncomfortable contact with everyone who has a stake in the country-from the government of Hamid Karzai to White House officials. Moreover, their radio and television networks soon become a necessary beacon for millions of Afghans, who rely on them not just for independent news but for joyful pleasures like soap operas and Afghan Star, a beloved national singing competition in a country whose previous rulers had banned (and would again ban) music. Mohseni's position at Moby affords him unique insights into this extraordinary yet troubled country, the youngest in the world outside of Sub-Saharan Africa, and his powerful account captures the spirit and resilience of the Afghan people-notably the hundreds of men and women still working in Moby's Kabul office today, who, once again under Taliban rule, create programs, report the news, and educate the public. Radio Free Afghanistan is a stunning, vibrant portrait of a nation in turmoil, poised between despair and hope." (Publisher description)
more