
Iginio GagliardoneUniversity of the Witwatersrand | wits · Department of Media Studies
Iginio Gagliardone
PhD, London School of Economics and Political Science
About
53
Publications
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Introduction
I am Professor of Media Studies at the University of the Witwatersrand. My research and teaching focus on the international politics of the Internet, and the use of old and new media for political change in Sub-Saharan Africa.
I am a member of Carnegie's Digital Democracy Network, a "group of leading thinkers and activists engaged in work on technology and politics", and of the International Panel on the Information Environment (IPIE). I completed my PhD at the London School of Economics investi
Additional affiliations
January 2016 - present
November 2011 - present
Publications
Publications (53)
As more Africans get online, information and communication technologies (ICTs) are increasingly hailed for their transformative potential. Yet, the fascination for the possibilities of promoting more inclusive forms of development in the information age have obfuscated the reality of the complex negotiations among political and economic actors who...
The exponential diffusion of mobile phones in Africa and their ability to interact with other media have created new avenues for individuals to interface with power. These forms of engagement, however, have primarily been interpreted through the lenses of the ‘liberation technology’ agenda, which privileges the relationship between citizens and the...
China, in seeking greater engagement with African audiences, has dramatically boosted its potential to shape narratives in ways that can favour its image or interests abroad. Focusing on CCTV Africa, China's flagship efforts to win hearts and minds on the continent, the article explains how this strategy has been pursued not by directly offering an...
This article explores whether, and to what extent, local knowledge features in research on the role of ICTs in statebuilding and peacebuilding in Africa, with a particular focus on neighboring Somalia, Kenya, and Ethiopia. We question whether the claims of the transformative power of ICTs are backed by ‘evidence’ and whether local knowledge – e.g.,...
The conception of digital sovereignty has been associated, especially in the early stages of the diffusion of the Internet, with efforts to keep specific data and information outside of a state's jurisdiction. AI sovereignty responds to an almost opposite logic, indicating the ability of a state to access and make use of data that are produced with...
Building on ethnographic work on local radio stations in Kenya, this chapter critically examines how interactive media can serve both as platforms for citizens to challenge those who are governing them and spaces where existing power structures reproduce themselves in new forms. Rather than focusing on normative assumptions about the media as a too...
The Middle East region has been a juncture of political violence, ethnic and sectarian tensions, authoritarian rise and rivalries between external powers and regional countries in the last decades. This seminar will cover issues surrounding state hegemony, gender-based inequalities, border and migration regimes as well as social movements, freedom...
The topic of detecting and analyzing online hate speech and toxic communication moves beyond selecting and designing appropriate and accurate research strategies, as it also raises complex questions at a conceptual, ethical, and methodological level. Conceptually, it involves understanding how competing definitions have emerged in legal, scholarly,...
This article presents new empirical insights into what people do with conspiracy theories during crises. By suppressing the
impulse to distinguish between truth and falsehood, which has characterized most scholarship on the COVID-19 “infodemic,”
and engaging with claims surrounding two popular COVID-19 conspiracies—on 5G and on Bill Gates—in South...
This article presents new empirical insights into what people do with conspiracy theories during crises. By suppressing the impulse to distinguish between truth and falsehood, which has characterized most scholarship on the COVID-19 “infodemic,” and engaging with claims surrounding two popular COVID-19 conspiracies—on 5G and on Bill Gates—in South...
This report introduces findings from ten digital rights landscape country reports on Zimbabwe, Zambia, Uganda, Sudan, South Africa, Nigeria, Kenya, Ethiopia, Egypt, and Cameroon. They analyse how the openings and closings of online civic space affect citizens’ digital rights. They show that: (1) when civic space closes offline citizens often respon...
The increasing support provided by China to African states to expand their information
infrastructure and the rise of Safe City (Huawei) and Smart City (ZTE) projects across Africa
have raised concerns about a possible tightening of civil liberties on the continent. Some of
these concerns are motivated by cases of abuse of Chinese-deployed surveill...
This paper offers conceptual and methodological tools for students and scholars to understand how Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) can influence and are influenced by different geographical and socio-political contexts. More specifically, the chapter (1) begins by examining subsequent forms of digital divide, related to the access...
L’implication croissante de la Chine dans le domaine des infrastructures de télécommunication en Afrique inquiète : le géant asiatique n’est-il pas en train d’imposer son modèle autoritaire de société de l’information au continent ? L’examen de la coopération chinoise dans trois pays africains va à l’encontre de cette thèse. Néanmoins, l’orientatio...
Security at the Borders: Transnational Practices and Technologies in West Africa. By Philippe M. Frowd. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2018. 226p. $99.99 cloth. - Volume 17 Issue 2 - Iginio Gagliardone
This article examines two apparently contradictory uses of digital media during elections: in 2005, when still nascent digital tools were employed by Ethiopians to contest power in ways that pre-configured tactics later adopted by protesters elsewhere in Africa and globally; and in 2015, when digital publics displayed disenchantment towards an elec...
Research on Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in Africa has often explored their relationships with politics—be it for their ability to affect participation, offer new tools for representation and accountability, or innovate reporting on politically relevant events. There is, however, another, deeper sense in which new media and pol...
This study examines key trends that have characterized global media in the period between 2012 and 2017, from the rise of new forms of “algorithmic pluralism” to the interactions between “media capture” and “fake news”. It combines regional and global perspectives to chart how different areas of the globe have interacted with the changes occurred i...
Freedom is to act as one’s real and true nature demands and so only the exercise of that choice which is of what is good can properly be called ‘free choice’. A choice for the better is therefore an act of freedom … Whereas a choice for the worse is not a choice as it is grounded in ignorance … it is then also not an exercise in freedom because fre...
Focusing on two online campaigns – one initiated by the Ethiopian blogging collective known as Zone9 and demanding the Ethiopian government to #RespectTheConstitution, and the other asking to #FreeZone9Bloggers, once some of the bloggers were arrested and accused of terrorism – this chapter examines opportunities and contradictions of digital activ...
The Internet in Africa has become an increasingly contested space, where competing ideas of development and society battle for hegemony. By comparing the evolution of the Internet in Ethiopia and Rwanda, we question whether policies and projects emerging from two of Africa’s fastest growing, but also most tightly controlled countries, can be unders...
The high-profile appearance of Chinese media organizations in Africa has attracted considerable attention. How Chinese correspondents in Africa actually go about their work is, however, little understood. A posting in Africa gives journalists at Xinhua News Agency or China Central Television a degree of freedom not experienced in China combined wit...
Transnational political communication involves interactions among state and non-state actors across national boundaries. The study of this subject is relatively recent, but increasingly relevant, as non-state actors such as nongovernmental organizations and multinational corporations proliferate and use a variety of media to influence policies and...
The study analyses the nature of online conversation in Ethiopia, with a particular focus on political participation and political conflict.
The role of media in promoting political accountability and citizen participation is a central issue in governance debates. Drawing on research into the interactions between radio station owners, journalists, audiences and public authorities during Somali radio call-in programmes we argue that these programmes do not simply offer a new platform for...
An ambitious experiment in the ICT and justice sector is underway in Ethiopia. As part of an effort to improve service delivery and the responsiveness of the state, the Ethiopian government has created ‘TeleCourt,’ a system that allows trials to take place between remote areas and regional or federal courts through videoconferencing and a satellite...
This report is the first of a series of three and examines how Ethiopians in Ethiopia and the diaspora are using social media to talk about politics, religion, and ethnicity. After illustrating the methodological choices that have been made to understand engagement and antagonism in the Ethiopian online sphere, the report suggests how and to which...
The Ethiopian government, led by the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF), has developed one of the most restrictive systems for the regulation of new media in Africa. So far, most discussion has focused on the measures employed by the EPRDF to prevent the Internet and mobile phones from becoming tools for opposition forces to...
This report provides a framework through which hate speech emerging and disseminated online can be identified and analysed. Its aims are twofold. Firstly, it is meant to offer an introductory guide for those interested in mapping and analysing hate speech, especially as communicated through online media and in divided societies. Section 1 offers an...
This article provides an empirically grounded assessment of China's increasing role in the African mediasphere. It examines the strategic importance of Chinese media assistance to Ghana along three dimensions: the potential appeal of the Chinese approach to information regulation for countries struggling to balance development and risks to politica...
This report is based on the outcomes of the workshop organized by the Programme in Comparative Media Law and Policy (PCMLP) at the University of Oxford and the Stanhope Centre for communications Policy Research. The workshop reflected on China’s growing influence in Africa’s communications sector and on the implications this has on the prevailing l...
The Center for Global Communication Studies (CGCS) evaluated BBC Media Action’s (formerly the BBC World Service Trust) impact on the world of global development research and practice. Through an online survey and in-depth interviews with key players in the field, CGCS analyzed the extent to which the organization’s research, workshops, and conferen...
This paper addresses how state actors in the developing world have influenced technology adoption and favoured the diffusion of certain uses of ICTs while discouraging others. Drawing upon extensive field research and looking at the evolution of ICTs in Ethiopia, it examines how a semi-authoritarian, yet developmentally oriented regime, has activel...
This chapter addresses how state actors in the developing world have influenced technology adoption and favoured the diffusion of certain uses of ICTs while discouraging others. Drawing upon extensive field research and looking at the evolution of ICTs in Ethiopia, it examines how a semi-authoritarian, yet developmentally oriented regime, has activ...
This thesis questions and examines the role Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) are playing in the political transitions of developing countries. While there is much discussion about the contribution of ICTs in promoting economic growth and supporting the democratisation process, there is less understanding of the ways in which ICTs...
This paper addresses how state actors in the developing world have influenced technology adoption and favoured the diffusion of certain uses of ICTs while discouraging others. Drawing upon extensive field research and looking at the evolution of ICTs in Ethiopia, it examines how a semi-authoritarian, yet developmentally oriented regime, has activel...
This paper outlines a research framework to assess attitudes towards peace and conflict and support a form of “grassroots diplomacy” in conflict and post-conflict societies. Based on research in Darfur conducted in 2007-2008, a combination of methods that can be effective tools for addressing this challenge is detailed. The intent is to provide a f...
The Researching Attitudes towards Peace and Conflict in Darfur project seeks to inform the ongoing peace process in Darfur by providing the various institutions involved in the mediation efforts with a deeper understanding of Darfurians’ perspectives on the causes of the conflict, its impact on their lives, and the role of the international communi...
This article investigates the evolution of the struggle for bridging the digital divide in developing countries. Taking into account tendencies that have been registered in disciplines other than development, such as urban sociology and social psychology, the author demonstrates how a frequent over-estimation of the potential of Information and Com...