Social Media and Elections in Africa, Volume 2
Social Media and Elections in Africa, Volume 2

Author: Martin N. Ndlela

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-02-14

Total Pages: 281

ISBN-13: 3030326829

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This book, the second of two volumes, explores the challenges and opportunities presented by the increased presence of social media within African politics. Electoral processes in Africa have assumed new dimensions due to the influence of social media. As social media permeates different aspects of elections, it is ostensibly creating new challenges and opportunities. Most evident are the challenges of hate speech, misogyny and incivility. This book considers the impact of digital media before, during, and after elections, as well as authorities' attempts to legislate and regulate the internet in response. Contributions to this volume analyse social media posts, transgressive images, newspaper articles, and include case studies of Algeria, Zimbabwe, Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria and Uganda. This results in the delivery of an original depiction of the use of social media in a variety of African contexts. This book will appeal to academics and students of media and communication studies, political studies, journalism, sociology, and African studies.

Social Media and Elections in Africa, Volume 1
Social Media and Elections in Africa, Volume 1

Author: Martin N. Ndlela

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-01-02

Total Pages: 246

ISBN-13: 3030305538

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This book brings together fresh evidence and new theoretical frameworks in a unique analysis of the increasing role of social media in political campaigns and electoral processes across Africa. Supported by contemporary and historical cases studies, it engages with the main drives behind the various appropriations of social media for election campaigns, organization, and voter mobilization. Contributors in this volume delve into changing and complex aspects of social media, offering an appraisal of theoretical perspectives and examining fascinating case studies which social media use is redefining elections across Africa. Contributions show that new media ecologies are resulting in new policy regimes, user behaviors, and communication models that have implications for electoral processes. The book also provides preliminary analysis of emerging forms of algorithm-driven campaigns, fake news, information distortions and other methods that undermine electoral democracy in Africa.

Social Media and Politics in Africa
Social Media and Politics in Africa

Author: Maggie Dwyer

Publisher: Zed Books Ltd.

Published: 2019-07-15

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 178699500X

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The smartphone and social media have transformed Africa, allowing people across the continent to share ideas, organise, and participate in politics like never before. While both activists and governments alike have turned to social media as a new form of political mobilization, some African states have increasingly sought to clamp down on the technology, introducing restrictive laws or shutting down networks altogether. Drawing on over a dozen new empirical case studies – from Kenya to Somalia, South Africa to Tanzania – this collection explores how rapidly growing social media use is reshaping political engagement in Africa. But while social media has often been hailed as a liberating tool, the book demonstrates how it has often served to reinforce existing power dynamics, rather than challenge them. Featuring experts from a range of disciplines from across the continent, this collection is the first comprehensive overview of social media and politics in Africa. By examining the historical, political, and social context in which these media platforms are used, the book reveals the profound effects of cyber-activism, cyber-crime, state policing and surveillance on political participation.

Social Media and Democracy
Social Media and Democracy

Author: Nathaniel Persily

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2020-09-03

Total Pages: 365

ISBN-13: 1108835554

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A state-of-the-art account of what we know and do not know about the effects of digital technology on democracy.

The Routledge Companion to Social Media and Politics
The Routledge Companion to Social Media and Politics

Author: Axel Bruns

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-12-22

Total Pages: 560

ISBN-13: 1317506561

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Social media are now widely used for political protests, campaigns, and communication in developed and developing nations, but available research has not yet paid sufficient attention to experiences beyond the US and UK. This collection tackles this imbalance head-on, compiling cutting-edge research across six continents to provide a comprehensive, global, up-to-date review of recent political uses of social media. Drawing together empirical analyses of the use of social media by political movements and in national and regional elections and referenda, The Routledge Companion to Social Media and Politics presents studies ranging from Anonymous and the Arab Spring to the Greek Aganaktismenoi, and from South Korean presidential elections to the Scottish independence referendum. The book is framed by a selection of keystone theoretical contributions, evaluating and updating existing frameworks for the social media age.

New Media Influence on Social and Political Change in Africa
New Media Influence on Social and Political Change in Africa

Author: Olorunnisola, Anthony A.

Publisher: IGI Global

Published: 2013-06-30

Total Pages: 518

ISBN-13: 1466641983

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While transitioning from autocracy to democracy, media in Africa has always played an important role in democratic and non-democratic states; focusing on politicians, diplomats, activists, and others who work towards political transformations. New Media Influence on Social and Political Change in Africa addresses the development of new mass media and communication tools and its influence on social and political change. While analyzing democratic transitions and cultures with a theoretical perspective, this book also presents case studies and national experiences for media, new media, and democracy scholars and practitioners.

Digital Dissidence and Social Media Censorship in Africa
Digital Dissidence and Social Media Censorship in Africa

Author: Farooq A. Kperogi

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2022-07-27

Total Pages: 319

ISBN-13: 1000618366

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This book reflects on the rapid rise of social media across the African continent and the legal and extra-legal efforts governments have invented to try to contain it. The relentless growth of social media platforms in Africa has provided the means of resistance, self-expression, and national self-fashioning for the continent’s restlessly energetic and contagiously creative youth. This has provided a profound challenge to the African "gatekeeper state", which has often responded with strategies to constrict and constrain the rhetorical luxuriance of the social media and digital sphere. Drawing on cases from across the continent, contributors explore the form and nature of social media and government censorship, often via antisocial media laws, or less overt tactics such as state cybersurveillance, spyware attacks on social media activists, or the artful deployment of the rhetoric of "fake news" as a smokescreen to muzzle critical voices. The book also reflects on the Chinese influence in African governments’ clampdown on social media and the role of Israeli NSO Group Technologies, as well as the tactics and technologies which activists and users are deploying to resist or circumvent social media censorship. Drawing on a range of methodologies and disciplinary approaches, this book will be an important contribution to researchers with an interest in social media activism, digital rebellion, discursive democracy in transitional societies, censorship on the Internet, and Africa more broadly.

Analyzing Global Social Media Consumption
Analyzing Global Social Media Consumption

Author: Wamuyu, Patrick Kanyi

Publisher: IGI Global

Published: 2020-10-16

Total Pages: 358

ISBN-13: 1799847195

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Social media has revolutionized how individuals, communities, and organizations create, share, and consume information. Similarly, social media offers numerous opportunities as well as enormous social and economic ills for individuals, communities, and organizations. Despite the increase in popularity of social networking sites and related digital media, there are limited data and studies on consumption patterns of the new media by different global communities. Analyzing Global Social Media Consumption is an essential reference book that investigates the current trends, practices, and newly emerging narratives on theoretical and empirical research on all aspects of social media and its global use. Covering topics that include fake news detection, social media addiction, and motivations and impacts of social media use, this book is ideal for big data analysts, media and communications experts, researchers, academicians, and students in media and communications, information systems, and information technology study programs.

Electoral Politics in Africa since 1990
Electoral Politics in Africa since 1990

Author: Jaimie Bleck

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018-11-29

Total Pages: 345

ISBN-13: 1108680623

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Democratic transitions in the early 1990s introduced a sea change in Sub-Saharan African politics. Between 1990 and 2015, several hundred competitive legislative and presidential elections were held in all but a handful of the region's countries. This book is the first comprehensive comparative analysis of the key issues, actors, and trends in these elections over the last quarter century. The book asks: what motivates African citizens to vote? What issues do candidates campaign on? How has the turn to regular elections promoted greater democracy? Has regular electoral competition made a difference for the welfare of citizens? The authors argue that regular elections have both caused significant changes in African politics and been influenced in turn by a rapidly changing continent - even if few of the political systems that now convene elections can be considered democratic, and even if many old features of African politics persist.

Digital Activism in Zimbabwe
Digital Activism in Zimbabwe

Author: Tenford Chitanana

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2024-10-21

Total Pages: 273

ISBN-13: 1040121144

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This book investigates the role of the internet and social media in political processes in non-western and non-democratic contexts. Using Zimbabwe as a case study, the book demonstrates how activists and ordinary people deploy social media, particularly Facebook, to subvert an enduring hegemonic state. However, the book also highlights how authoritarian regimes are in turn learning and adapting to the information age, challenging the impact of digital activism. Studies of digital activism in the Global South are often centred around democracy, but this book paints a more complex picture, examining the role and effect of digital activism in challenging state hegemony in authoritarian contexts. The book notes that while communication technologies help mediate activism, they are also simultaneously constrained by pre-existing and emergent challenges tied to the social and political context and the inherent limitations of those technologies. The book investigates the tactics used by digital activists, the contextual factors and restrictive political environment they operate in, including the role of pro-government activists, and ultimately, the impact of digital activism given these constraints. From the case of Zimbabwe, the book builds out a broader theoretical analysis of the evolution of ‘third world protest’ in the digital age, examining the limitations of activists’ actions and the ideological deficit in online activism to ferment a virulent counter hegemony.