Digital Activities Research Articles

The online exchange of conspiracy theories within an Irish extreme right wing Telegram group during the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT While the extreme right wing (ERW) has not gained a foothold in local or national Irish politics, the country has witnessed a growth in online activism and harassment, and physical protest and violence. This paper explores a case study based on 4876 unique posts from one Irish-based Telegram group active during six months of the COVID-19 pandemic. The main findings are that: (a) this group was heavily influenced by foreign content and influencers, in particular, American ERW content and conspiracies associated with QAnon; (b) conspiracy theories were not adopted wholesale but adapted for an Irish audience; (c) Irish actors were not passive receivers of US content, and multi-directional exchanges of ideas were witnessed. While generalising beyond the case study analysed in this paper would require further data, this may suggest that Irish influencers are part of a transnational online ecosystem in which ideas and theories are shared and adapted to local contexts. These findings offer insights into the ERW in Ireland and, more generally, how the ERW communicates and spread conspiracy theories across national borders.

Radios y Cacerolas

This article elaborates a feminist digital activist perspective on the Colombian national strike of 2021 through the work of two women-led collectives (colectivas) in which I participated from afar, as part of the Colombian diaspora. Radio Lila is a collective of women living in Cali’s oriente, and Cacerola Collective is formed by Colombians in the diaspora, mostly people working in the creative industries. Through the study of these colectivas’s praxis, this article argues that women-led collectives use digital tools and the internet not only to set up political actions but also to create online places for care and mourning. This argument makes conspicuous how there is a gap in the research on digital activism, concerning the emotional tools activists seek to transit political uprisals and their aftermaths. In other words, we see here how feminist research on social media can also focus on retreating, going offline, as a way of personal and communal care.

Remembering like a state: Surveillance databases, digital activist traces and the repressive potential of mediated prospective memory

Departing from personal memories of protests in London and Berlin, in this article I make space within the memory-activism nexus to consider how contemporary activists are remembered by that which they conventionally target: the state. To do this, I first recount existing understandings of that nexus and the position of the state therein. I then emphasise how states remember activists via police surveillance databases before discussing the digital activist traces held in such databases via the concept of mediated prospective memory. Thereafter, I empirically ground these conceptual contributions via a discussion of the surveillance databases used in the United Kingdom and Germany and the growing adoption of automated facial recognition technology in these countries. This discussion relies on the work of police monitoring groups whose activism contributes, alongside the various actions of the state and its agencies that I foreground, to the complexity of the memory-activism nexus.

Online monitoring activism: civic surveillance practices as a reaction to the rise of the far-right in the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT The rise of far-right movements during the COVID-19 pandemic has prompted a new form of individual digital activism: online monitoring activism (OMA). During the pandemic, online monitoring activists systematically collected, processed and published information from far-right Telegram channels and groups. Against the theoretical background of concepts like the monitory democracy and surveillance culture, we conducted eight semi-structured interviews with German online monitoring activists, investigating their motivations, roles, and the intricacies of their monitoring practices. Our findings reveal that online monitoring activists are driven by a sense of duty to counteract anti-democratic tendencies, which they perceive as inadequately addressed by institutional power. They gain localized and thematically specialized expertise that they share within loose networks of like-minded others. We highlight the activists’ liminal identity oscillating between virtuous citizenship and vigilantism, as well as the broader societal implications of their actions. On the one hand, they fulfill the role of active citizenship in monitory democracy; on the other, they also reinforce the transparency imperative and the wish for far-reaching security and control inherent to surveillance culture. The transparency potential afforded by their adversaries’ online connective action and mobilizing efforts legitimizes their surveillance and demands surveillance. Further normative work is needed to critically examine the extent and desirability of increased social control introduced to liberal democracy by online monitoring activism.

The meaning of obstetric violence experiences: A qualitative content analysis of the Break the Silence Campaign

BackgroundObstetric violence involves the mistreatment, disrespect, and abuse of birthing people and the problem has been recognized in healthcare systems worldwide. Obstetric violence is a gendered, sex-specific form of violence against women that is a public health problem and a violation of human rights. There are an unknowable number of online posts and social media messages that describe obstetric violence experiences. There are no known studies about self-published experiences of obstetric violence in the US maternity care system. ObjectiveTo understand the meaning of obstetric violence experiences in the US maternity care system from a naturally occurring, purposive sample. DesignA secondary analysis of the textual data from the original Break the Silence social media campaign using qualitative content analysis. The theory of social justice in nursing provided a theoretical framework. A healthcare systems approach was used for a wide-angle view of the multidirectional structure, processes, and outcome of obstetric violence. SettingThe study setting is the public Facebook page where the Break the Silence social media campaign can be seen. Break the Silence was an online activism response to the problem of obstetric violence in the US maternity care system with signboard messages posted from 31 known US states. The setting is bounded by the digital page where the campaign is published. ParticipantsThere were 139 participants, and 11 of them posted more than one signboard message. Most participants were birthing people (n = 125) followed by doulas (n = 10). MethodsKrippendorff's methodology for qualitative content analysis was applied to 156 signboard messages posted on Break the Silence from 2014 to 2016. Qualitative content analysis was supported by Atlas.ti 23. ResultsFour themes illustrated the meaning of obstetric violence in US maternity care: 1) pregnancy and birth as a battle with healthcare providers and the healthcare system, 2) sacrifice of the maternal body normalized and assumed as a gender stereotype, 3) disrupted rites of passage from childbirth, and 4) abuse of fiduciary power by healthcare providers. ConclusionsThis study demonstrated thematic meanings for the experience of obstetric violence in US maternity care with a healthcare systems approach that included structural and organizational considerations to increase understanding. Categories and forms of obstetric violence from the existing literature were expanded and strengthened by findings from this study. Themes were validated in principle with consistency in findings across the international evidence base on obstetric violence.Tweetable abstract: The meaning of #obstetricviolence experiences is interpersonal and structural with thematic consistency across international studies.

The Impact of Social Media on Students' Awareness and Engagement with Social Issues

Aims: This study aimed to investigate the impact of social media on university students' awareness and engagement with social issues. Study Design: The study followed a cross-sectional study design. Place and Duration of Study: The study was conducted at G B Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar, Uttarakhand, India, over a period of three months from March 2024 to June 2024. Methodology: A convenience sampling technique was used to select 100 students, predominantly male (74.00%), mostly aged 18-24 years (56.00%), with the majority from the College of Agriculture (75.00%). Data were collected using a structured Google form survey assessing social media usage, awareness of social issues, and engagement behaviors. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. Results: The study found that social media significantly enhances awareness of social issues, with (54.00%) of respondents rating their awareness as high after exposure, compared to (31.00%) before social media exposure. Engagement levels were moderate, with (58.00%) of students participating in online campaigns and (46.00%) moderately likely to engage in social issues after exposure. Key actions taken included sharing posts (53.00%), volunteering (45.00%), attending events and donating (42.00%), and using hashtags (33.00%). Conclusion: The results demonstrate that social media is a powerful tool for enhancing awareness and encouraging civic engagement among university students, suggesting its potential for driving meaningful social change.

The EU soft regulation of digital campaigning: regulatory effectiveness through platform compliance to the code of practice on disinformation

ABSTRACT How does the European Union handle the soft regulation of digital political campaigning? We assesses the effectiveness of the EU's soft governance concerning digital campaigning by examining how global digital platforms respond to the EU Code of Practice on Disinformation. In doing so, we advance a framework for analysis which measures specific steps in the platform compliance with soft law. Our results, based on the content analysis of platforms' annual reports, show that compliance depends on the priority assigned to regulatory themes by on-line corporations. Overall, we find higher levels of platform formal commitment rather than symbolic commitment through forms of report editing to signal compliance with the code of practice. Our analysis also shows evidence of implementation following from formal commitments when reporting requirements are less rigid. Consequently, EU soft governance can be effective for digital campaigning in areas prioritised by the addressees of regulation.

Digital political campaigning: contemporary challenges and regulation

ABSTRACT How can multiple organizational, social, and political actors effectively address the contemporary challenges of digital political campaigning? We proceed by reviewing the increased theoretical and empirical importance of digital political campaigning. We discuss the new research advances in the field and acknowledge the necessity for interdisciplinary research given the rapidly evolving techniques and the imminent positive and negative risks of digital campaigning. We present a multi-level actor approach for dealing with the risks of digital political campaigning. We outline the contribution of this issue and identify relevant gaps for future research.

Potential of digital technologies in the formation of civic identity in youth environment

Introduction. The civic identity of young people and the search for effective means of educating them is a decisive tool for creating a future at the state level as a legitimate community. Digital space today is considered as a mental subsystem of the collective consciousness of the modern generation. In this context, the aim of this study is quite relevant: to identify the potential of digital technologies in the formation of civic identity among young people. Materials and methods. The main research method was a survey of youth in the Lipetsk region. The study involved 431 respondents aged 14 to 25 years. The respondents were surveyed in March 2024. The study used, firstly, the author’s questionnaire to study the digital participation of young people in the civil-patriotic movement, and secondly, the “Profile of Civil Personal Identity” methodology (E.V. Belovol, S.V. Melkov, E.B. Puchkova). To process the survey results, the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 26 program was used. For statistical data processing, the nonparametric Kruskal-Wallis H test was used. Results. Among the youth, the dominant position is that of observers of the development of civil society in the digital space (44%), 29% of respondents take a passive position in terms of digital activism, 27% of respondents take an active position. However, these results are statistically insignificant (Hemp = 3.674 at a significance level of 0.001). Significant factors of digital activism include: age over 18 years (Hemp = 7.349 at a significance level of 0.001), university education (Hemp = 7.125 at a significance level of 0.001) or work activity (Hemp = 7.125 at a significance level of 0.001), urban living environment (Hemp = 8.109 at a significance level of 0.001). Digital resources are in demand among young people to varying degrees, depending on the model of digital activism. Digital activists largely use the resources of non-profit organizations of a civil and patriotic nature, as well as promotions and competitive movements of all-Russian projects. Digital observers limit themselves to turning to the educational content of large government projects “Conversations about what is important”, “Russia – my horizons”, and “Movement of the First.” Conclusion. The possibilities and demand for digital resources with civic and patriotic content are explored depending on the model of digital activism. The results of the study can help improve the effectiveness of educational work with young people, as well as the development of digital resources with civic and patriotic content.

The Effectiveness of Offline and Online Campaigns towards Eco-Friendly Attitude and Intention in Reducing The Use of Plastic Cups

The Effectiveness of Offline and Online Campaigns towards Eco-Friendly Attitude and Intention in Reducing The Use of Plastic Cups

Riot Like a Girl? Gender-Stereotypical Associations Boost Support for Feminist Online Campaigns

The current study examined whether congruence with gender stereotypes is associated with support for online feminist campaigns. In Study 1 (Ntweets = 510,000), we investigated how two real-world movements (i.e., #metoo and #sexstrike) were viewed in terms of adhering to the traditional feminine stereotype of high warmth/communion and low competence/agency, as per language used in the tweets posted within each campaign. We found that the #metoo movement was characterised by more communal and less agentic content than #sexstrike. In Study 2 (N = 195), when presented with descriptions of the movements modelled after #metoo and #sexstrike, participants associated the #metoo-like campaign with more feminine (e.g., community orientation) and less masculine concepts (e.g., rebelliousness), which, in turn, translated to greater declared support for the campaign. In Study 3 (N = 446), conducted in a more controlled and context-independent setting, we once again observed the link between the gender stereotypes attached to feminist movements and the support they received. We also found that this effect was independent of the effect of perceiving movements as violating social norms. Controlling for feminist identification, political conservatism, and gender system justification did not affect the pattern of results. Uncovering these stereotype-related effects on support for feminist movements furthers understanding of the strategies that might be used in the fight for gender equality.

Analyzing marketing campaign effectiveness: a comparative approach using traditional and online data analysis methods

Advertising campaign analysis reports are considered an essential tool for marketing analytics. They are used to assess the effectiveness of the marketing activities carried out and to improve future activities. It is necessary to verify whether the actions taken - online and in the public space - align with the intentions and budget, whether they lead to achieving the objectives, and, if not, what the campaign errors are. Due to the ease of collecting and accessing data, analyzing online and social media advertising campaigns is a popular topic. With access to data on the number of clicks, the ad's reach, the number of interactions, and so on, one can move on to the next steps of analyzing the campaign to determine its effectiveness. Online marketing tools have a massive advantage over traditional media channels. When analyzing the results of advertising campaigns, it is necessary to approach the examination of the individual channels and then analyze which of them is the most profitable and in which to invest the most. However, traditional campaigns must be addressed in the analyses. Despite the limited data available, collecting relevant information and analyzing the traditional campaign is worth trying. In the case of conventional campaigns, we can mainly measure the amount of sales resulting from the campaigns. When dealing with an online campaign, we gain many additional indicators, such as the number of ad impressions, clicks, and conversions. In both cases, analysis tools may allow us to isolate factors that significantly influence the success or failure of a campaign and predict the effectiveness of a campaign with given characteristics.

“Can you guess what every woman’s worst nightmare is?”: Good for Her Film, and Contextualising Rape-Revolt in post-Weinstein America and Promising Young Woman

The #MeToo moment following Harvey Weinstein's sexual abuse allegations led to a change in the way we make sense of ra;e allegations within popular discourse. In film, changes to the discursive construction of women's rights movements became key to what Barbara Creed calls the Feminist New Wave cinema. The rape-revenge film inserts itself into this new landscape of social and online activism too, as it starts to evolve into a 'rape-revolt' narrative structure, which aims to treat rape within film as a source of political revolt and a way to challenge institutions which uphold rape culture. Promising Young Woman (Emerald Fennell, 2020) interrogates these changes to the public reception of rape culture within a post-Weinstein framework which allows for a nuanced perspective on rape-revenge, taking into account a flawed criminal justice system, corrupt institutions, and enablers' personal failures. This article argues that the Weinstein scandal and its consequence on public discourse have started to influence the ways in which cinema makes sense of rape, and furthermore situates films of the Feminist New Wave within a movement which social media users have called the 'Good for Her' film. 

Challenging and Enhancing Legitimacy Through Humor: A Comparative Study of Candidates’ Use of Humor on Facebook before the 2019 and 2023 Finnish Parliamentary Elections

A prevalent aspect of contemporary digital campaigning is the use of humor to attract attention, elicit amusement, and mark group boundaries. This study investigates the humor in digital campaigns during two recent Finnish parliamentary elections, focusing on how different styles of humor are used to (de)legitimize political ideas and actors. Our original dataset consists of 125,604 posts by 1262 candidates on Facebook six months before the 2019 and 2023 election days. Using Facebook’s haha reactions and manual coding to annotate humor style, we focused on 729 posts with seemingly intentional humor by candidates. We show how different parties and individual candidates used humor to varying degrees and in different styles. Overall, the proportion of humorous posts was not high, but the populist radical right Finns Party candidates used humor by far the most, and their style was primarily aggressive, aimed at delegitimizing the incumbent government, political opponents, and their reference groups. Candidates from other major parties also used some humor, but overall the tone was more positive. Some of these candidates were profiled as “humor specialists” who produced similar combinations of ridicule and anti-elitism as the Finns Party candidates or, alternatively, focused on disseminating self-deprecating and affiliative humor. Affiliative and self-deprecating humor was used to foster closeness, ordinariness, and spontaneity, thus legitimizing oneself as a relatable candidate. The paper discusses how candidates use humor strategically to stand out in a competition for attention between candidates, and elaborates on the implications of using different humor styles in strategic political communication.

HUBUNGAN PARENTAL-PEER ATTACHMENT DENGAN SELF-ESTEEM PADA PEMAIN INTERNET GAMING

There are many internet-based activities, one of which is internet gaming, which, at a certain level of frequency, can lead individuals to internet addiction. This research, conducted with meticulous attention to detail, aims to determine the relationship between parental-peer attachment and self-esteem as two factors that are closely related to internet addiction behavior. The study was meticulously conducted on 38 young adult male and female internet gaming players using the Inventory of Parent and Peer Attachment-Revised (IPPA-R) and the Self-Esteem Scale (SES). Data were rigorously analyzed using one-tailed Spearman statistical analysis. The results show a positive relationship between Parental-Peer Attachment and Self-Esteem in internet gaming players. The alienation dimension in Mother, Father, and Peer Attachment has the most significant relationship. Self-competence and Self-liking dimensions have a negative relationship, so that these two dimensions will decrease or increase if one dimension experiences a decrease or increase. Further studies on the other psychological factors that underly internet gaming behavior potentially support the prevention of addiction.

Dynamics of Online Campaign Implementation in Regional Head Elections (Case Study of the 2020 Simultaneous Regional Head Elections in Semarang)

The covid-19 pandemic has caused the implementation of the 2020 Simultaneous Regional Head Elections in Semarang to face a few challenges. All stages must adapt to health protocols. Including the campaign stages which must be online-based. With this new method, many party doubt about the effectiveness. Therefore, the objectives of this study are to examine how the dynamics of the implementation of online campaign stages in the 2020 Simultaneous Regional Head Elections in Semarang, as well as to find out what problems still need to be fixed..

Journalists’ Ethical Responsibility: Tackling Hate Speech Against Women Politicians in Social Media Through Natural Language Processing Techniques

Social media has led to a redefinition of the journalist’s role. Specifically on Twitter, these professionals assume an influential position and their discourse is dominated by personal opinions. Taking into consideration that this platform has proven to be a breeding ground for polarization, digital harassment and hate speech, notably against women politicians, this research aims to analyze journalists’ involvement in this complex scenario. The investigation aims to determine whether, immersed in online and gender defamation campaigns, journalists enhance the quality of public debate or, on the contrary, they reinforce the visibility of this hostile content. To this end, we examined a sample of 63,926 tweets published from 23 to 25 November 2022 related to a campaign of political violence against the Spanish Minister of Equality using Natural Language Processing tools and qualitative content analysis. Results show that during those three days, at least half of the tweets contained hate speech and improper language. In this climate of hostility, journalists participating in the debate not only have an ability to attract likes and retweets but also exhibit polarization and use hate speech. Each ideological position—for and against the Minister—is also reflected in their own uncivil strategies. Under the umbrella of free speech and regardless of argumentative discourses, those journalists who lean towards ideological progressivism tend to insult their opponents, and those on the political right use divisive constructions, stereotyping and irony as attack techniques.

Pengaruh Aktivis Mahasiswa Dalam Perubahan Sosial Politik Di Era Digital 5.0

The study explores how student activists at the Islamic State University of North Sumatra (UINSU) influence the socio-political dynamics of the digital era 5.0. This era is marked by technological advances that integrate the physical, digital, and biological worlds, thus providing a new platform for student activism. Student activists not only act as agents of change through social and political activities, but they also use digital technology to expand their influence. The research uses a survey method with structured questionnaires distributed to UINSU student activists, as well as a qualitative approach to gaining an in-depth understanding of their views, attitudes, and experiences of socio-political change. Research findings indicate that student activists effectively use social media and digital technology for campaigns and mobilization. Through social media and internet platforms, activists can quickly mobilize people and draw attention to key topics such as gender equality, climate change, and human rights on a global scale. In the digital age of 5.0, student activists can also more successfully challenge existing forces by using digital tactics, including online campaigns, digital petitions, and online boycott movements, in addition to conducting physical demonstrations in public spaces. They not only use technology as a tool of struggle, but also as a new space for building critical awareness and solidarity. However, the research also finds challenges faced by student activists, such as the spread of disinformation and hoaxes, digital gaps, and technology access. Nonetheless, student activists continue to adapt quickly and innovate to overcome these barriers. The study provides significant insights into the role of digital technology in student activism and its implications for healthy political participation in the digital age 5.0, as well as solutions to strengthen the integrity of democracy at the local level.

Wo∼Men and Leadership: Re-Thinking the State of Research on Gender and Leadership Through Waves of Feminist Thinking

Feminist thinking has contributed to changing views of women in society and in leadership positions. Yet women are still underrepresented in leadership, especially in key roles and at higher organizational ranks. In this commentary we examine the past, present, and future of leadership theories through a gendered lens, by considering them against the backdrop of feminist theory evolution. We first organize existing leadership theories according to four main feminist waves— gender reform feminism or “fixing the women” which corresponds with liberal feminism; gender resistance feminism or “the female advantage,” reflecting radical feminism; the gender rebellion feminism or “how is a wo(man) defined,” according to postmodern and intersectionality theories, and gender digital feminism or “hashtag and clicktivism revolution” that focuses on social media, cyber activism, sexual violence, and complex intersectionality. We further examine the implications and research findings of these theories for women and men in leadership. Second, we review the publications on gender and leadership in two exemplary journals publishing leadership research in the field between 2019 and 2022 and explore to which feminist wave the published works relate. We show that themes related to the first two waves of feminist thinking continue to be dominant in current leadership research and encourage moving into new terrains, utilizing current feminist thinking, in the study of leadership and gender. Finally, we raise awareness that in a gendered society, leadership theories may reproduce and reconstruct the existing social order and gendered arrangements, as well as map novel directions for future research.

Becoming augmented: The latent possibilities of ethnography in a pandemic

For all its wretched ways, COVID:19 has installed new possibilities to the way we do ethnographic research. Due to pandemic restrictions, my research on how digital activists in Sri Lanka acquire influence on social media fell into three distinct phases: (i) digital ethnography from London, (ii) datafied approaches in Helsinki and (iii) traditional fieldwork in Colombo. The article’s objective is not to provincialise the three cases, but to demonstrate how each phase is tightly bound together and serve to imagine new possibilities in research design. Vlad Glăveanu contents that ‘human beings live “amphibious” lives – at once in the realm of the actual and the possible’ to emphasis the misty line between what is real and what can be manifested by innovation and action. Not dissimilar to this amphibiousness, I argue that human beings also live ‘augmented’ lives, at once in the realm of in real life (IRL) and online spaces and experiences mediated by digital technologies. My fingers, ears and eyes, while in London, Helsinki or Colombo, were always partly submerged in digital worlds, and it was this augmentation that enabled the long-term engagement that good ethnography demands.