اتجاهات الشباب المصري نحو حرية التعبير على شبكة الإنترنت: في إطار نموذج التحليل الثقافي

Abstract

According to statistics released in December 2017, the number of web users in Egypt are about 49.23 million. This represents about 49.5% of the population estimated at 99.4 million. The number of users subscribed on the Facebook network is about 35 million. Youth represent the largest segment of web users, including applications and multimedia. This study examines Egyptian youth trends and attitudes towards freedom of expression across multiple platforms, through objective and codified mechanisms, that lead to an integrated understanding of the role of the internet in promoting freedom of expression from the end user’s perspective. Since the study is concerned with the effects of cultural characteristics of Egyptian society in determining the users’ assessment of the web, it is based on the Cultural Analysis Model, which takes into account the general features that support or impede these characteristics in the youth’s digital freedom of expression in the web’s virtual environment. The study uses the survey methodology, in both descriptive and analytical terms, when relying on a sample of the youth population, he used the Available Sample method, since it is the most widely used sample in the field of surveys conducted on relatively homogeneous societies, as is the case in the youth community, which has many common characteristics, given the similarity of age groups and the shared social and cultural beliefs. The study was conducted on a sample of 400 respondents in the greater Cairo region, including cities of Qalioubia, Cairo, and Giza, since it is the most densely populated region among the seven regions of Egypt. It also includes several subsets of Egyptian society, both economically and culturally. The results of the study indicate that the web does not contribute to social consensus, because it is operated horizontally, therefore its users impose their priorities on its different applications, in contrast to the traditional means of agenda setting.