The adoption of social messaging apps in Iran: Discourses and challenges

2021 ◽  
pp. 026666692110220
Author(s):  
Abolghasem Bayat ◽  
Mohammad Fathian ◽  
Naser Bagheri Moghaddam ◽  
Amirali Saifoddin

Today, social networks are the most popular and widely used applications among smartphone users all around the world. Three years ago, the Telegram messaging app was the most widely used social messaging app in Iran due to its technical features and user-friendliness. Despite its popularity, Telegram caused controversial debates among policymakers and public opinion. To discover the nature of these conflicts, two main discourses were identified through qualitative data analysis based on Laclau and Mouffe’s discourse theory. Proponents of Minaret discourse consider the Telegram as a threat to national security, thus they have tried to provide favorable condition to limit using it, and develop alternative domestic apps. In contrast, Cylinder discourse supports using the Telegram app to fulfill citizens’ digital rights and their rights of privacy and freedom of expression. This discursive conflict among policymakers, along with users’ resistance, resulted in some failures in the adoption of foreign apps (e.g., Telegram). Despite the extensive technical, financial, and moral supports to popularize domestic apps, users still prefer foreign apps such as Telegram, WhatsApp, and Instagram. The analysis of emergent discourses demonstrates the origins of contestations and provides insights into how to adopt social messaging apps.

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 82
Author(s):  
Chibuzor Chile Nwobueze ◽  
James Okolie-Osemene ◽  
Ndu John Young

Currently, Nigeria’s security sector needs effective policing considering the spate of insecurity and frustrated relationship between the citizens and the police. Consequently, some officers are seen as dishonest and agents of complicity. Unlike most parts of the world where the people love, support the police, Nigeria still records threats to police-public relations owing to the attitudes of some officers who tarnish the image of the security agency through uncivilised, inhuman and unlawful acts while on duty and beyond. With qualitative data, this paper explores how training and people-oriented security education can enhance effective policing for a more secure Nigeria. This paper argues that police effectiveness should no longer be hinged only on equipping officers for counter-terrorism or establishment of special units to eradicate organised crime, but also on training them on weekly/monthly basis to respond to rapidly emerging threats to national security and trainings on enhancing collaborative police-public relations.


Author(s):  
Gehan Gunatilleke

Abstract The freedom of expression is vital to our ability to convey opinions, convictions, and beliefs, and to meaningfully participate in democracy. The state may, however, ‘limit’ the freedom of expression on certain grounds, such as national security, public order, public health, and public morals. Examples from around the world show that the freedom of individuals to express their opinions, convictions, and beliefs is often imperilled when states are not required to meet a substantial justificatory burden when limiting such freedom. This article critiques one of the common justificatory approaches employed in a number of jurisdictions to frame the state’s burden to justify limitations on the freedom of expression—the proportionality test. It presents a case for an alternative approach that builds on the merits and addresses some of the weaknesses of a typical proportionality test. This alternative may be called a ‘duty-based’ justificatory approach because it requires the state to demonstrate—through the presentation of publicly justifiable reasons—that the individual concerned owes others a duty of justice to refrain from the expressive conduct in question. The article explains how this approach is more normatively compelling than a typical proportionality test. It also illustrates how such an approach can better constrain the state’s ability to advance majoritarian interests or offload its positive obligations by limiting the freedom of expression of minorities and dissenting voices.


Author(s):  
Sanjay Chhataru Gupta

Popularity of the social media and the amount of importance given by an individual to social media has significantly increased in last few years. As more and more people become part of the social networks like Twitter, Facebook, information which flows through the social network, can potentially give us good understanding about what is happening around in our locality, state, nation or even in the world. The conceptual motive behind the project is to develop a system which analyses about a topic searched on Twitter. It is designed to assist Information Analysts in understanding and exploring complex events as they unfold in the world. The system tracks changes in emotions over events, signalling possible flashpoints or abatement. For each trending topic, the system also shows a sentiment graph showing how positive and negative sentiments are trending as the topic is getting trended.


2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 111-119
Author(s):  
Yu.Yu. IERUSALIMSKY ◽  
◽  
A.B. RUDAKOV ◽  

The article is devoted to the study of such an important aspect of the activities of the World Russian People's Council (until 1995 it was called the World Russian Council) in the 90-s of the 20-th century as a discussion of national security issues and nuclear disarmament. At that time, a number of political and public figures actively called for the nuclear disarmament of Russia. Founded in 1993, the World Russian Council called for the Russian Federation to maintain a reasonable balance between reducing the arms race and fighting for the resumption of detente in international relations, on the one hand, and maintaining a powerful nuclear component of the armed forces of the country, on the other. The resolutions of the World Russian Council and the World Russian People's Council on the problems of the new concepts formation of foreign policy and national security of Russia in the context of NATO's eastward movement are analyzed in the article. It also shows the relationship between the provisions of the WRNS on security and nuclear weapons issues with Chapter VIII of the «Fundamentals of the Social Concept of the Russian Orthodox Church».


Author(s):  
María Cristina García

In response to the terrorist attacks of 1993 and 2001, the Clinton and Bush administrations restructured the immigration bureaucracy, placed it within the new Department of Homeland Security, and tried to convey to Americans a greater sense of safety. Refugees, especially those from Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria, suffered the consequences of the new national security state policies, and found it increasingly difficult to find refuge in the United States. In the post-9/11 era, refugee advocates became even more important to the admission of refugees, reminding Americans of their humanitarian obligations, especially to those refugees who came from areas of the world where US foreign policy had played a role in displacing populations.


Author(s):  
Barbara J. Risman

This is the first data chapter. In this chapter, respondents who are described as true believers in the gender structure, and essentialist gender differences are introduced and their interviews analyzed. They are true believers because, at the macro level, they believe in a gender ideology where women and men should be different and accept rules and requirements that enforce gender differentiation and even sex segregation in social life. In addition, at the interactional level, these Millennials report having been shaped by their parent’s traditional expectations and they similarly feel justified to impose gendered expectations on those in their own social networks. At the individual level, they have internalized masculinity or femininity, and embody it in how they present themselves to the world. They try hard to “do gender” traditionally.


Vestnik NSUEM ◽  
2022 ◽  
pp. 135-143
Author(s):  
M. V. Karmanov ◽  
O. A. Zolotareva

The maintenance of civil peace and harmony in the Russian state from time immemorial has been defined as a priority that allows maintaining the integrity of both state and territorial. Global processes taking place in the world, epidemic waves of viruses, incessant local wars, diligent attempts to separate people and peoples bring to the fore the need to consolidate society in order to ensure the national security of the country. In this context, the importance of statistics increases, which significantly affects the perception of the dominant values by society, forms the attitude of people to the state policy being pursued. At the same time, the understanding of statistical information (figures, data) in a number of cases does not correspond to reality, making it difficult to adequately assess the existing situation, which is associated with an insufficient level of statistical literacy of the population, officials and specialists in various fields of activity.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 36-51
Author(s):  
Sabrina Magris

The paper addresses the importance of the role of women in Intelligence and National Security with the specific purpose to highlight the quality of female contribution in all different domains. The world is changing and in this change, Intelligence risks being left behind as never before. An epic evolution and change are underway that will upset ways of being and ways of thinking. All this not suddenly and all this without realizing it if not after the fact. The world is changing, women “are gain the upper hand” taking over also numerically and it is not realized that a change must happen in the field of Intelligence with a space left to women, not because they are women but because of their abilities. In all domains, from strategic to an operational one. Blindness to change that many Agencies are having. And those who are making changes often do so because they are obliged by the rules but not by evaluating the concrete capability of individuals. Two factors risk being explosive if no action is taken. The paper highlights the physiological and psychological contribution of the female component in the National Security and Intelligence work, and why diversity is scientifically important to successfully conduct operational and strategic tasks. It also describes the existing lack of models, how to enlarge the interest of young girls to join the Intelligence Community, and a look into the near future regarding the training and the recruitment processes with specific regards to women.


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