Transformation and Setbacks in Ethiopia

This chapter focuses on political changes occurring in Ethiopia and their implications for digital technology. Since the early 2000s, Ethiopia has displayed a dismal track record when it comes to digital freedom. Internet shutdowns, rising disinformation, and traditions of online censorship and surveillance characterize Ethiopia’s digital environment. New prime minister Abiy Ahmed has ushered in important shifts, many of which are still in the early stages of implementation. Digital repression in 2020 looks very differently from prior years. This chapter discusses political change in Ethiopia and the impact of Abiy’s agenda. It describes the landscape of digital repression in the country, focusing on Internet shutdowns, rising levels of social disinformation and disinformation, as well as ongoing surveillance and censorship concerns. It then explains relevant factors that have shaped Ethiopia’s digital repression environment before turning to examine China’s influence in the country.

How Artificial Intelligence and Big Data Are Transforming Repression

This chapter examines how artificial intelligence (AI) and big-data technology are reshaping repression strategies and why they are a boon for autocratic leaders. It explores two in-depth scenarios that describe potential state deploy AI and big-data techniques to accomplish political objectives. It presents a global index of AI and big-data surveillance that measures the use of these tools in 179 countries. It then presents a detailed explanation for specific types of AI and big-data surveillance: safe cities, facial recognition systems, smart policing, and social media surveillance. Subsequently, it examines China’s role in proliferating AI and big-data surveillance technology, and it reviews public policy considerations regarding use of this technology by democracies.

Responding to Digital Repression

This chapter discusses strategies civil society groups can use to raise the costs of repression associated with the dictator’s digital dilemma. It examines specific approaches activists can pursue to counter state repression, such as using reputational, economic, political, and supply-side pressure to reverse regime advantages. Turning to the private sector, it describes companies’ roles and responsibilities in relation to digital repression. It contends that democracies should consider advancing a stronger normative framework that will set clearer guidelines about responsible corporate behavior related to digital technology. Such steps will help companies push back on political demands from nondemocratic states. Finally, it proposes strategies that democracies and civil society can adopt to counter the proliferation of digital repression equipment and services provided by authoritarian states like China and Russia, and it discusses policy implications of the COVID-19 pandemic in relation to digital technology.

Global Patterns of Digital Repression

This chapter presents quantitative data to explain the main arguments of the book. Specifically, it provides pooled, cross-national, time-series data to describe global patterns of digital repression, and it uses that data to develop and validate two composite indexes: a latent construct of digital repression and a latent construct of digital repression capacity. It discusses overall findings from the digital repression index—the relationship between regime type and digital repression, highest- and lowest-performing countries, as well as outliers. It also compares digital repression enactment to capacity, and investigates differences between autocracies and democracies. Finally, it analyzes individual components of digital repression—social media surveillance, online censorship, social manipulation and disinformation, Internet shutdowns, and arrests of online users for political content—and provide explanations for authoritarian and democratic use.

Thailand’s Strategy of Control

This chapter presents a case study of how the Thai state deploys digital repression techniques to advance its political agenda. Thailand’s situation offers insights into how an autocratic state with a tradition of censorship and political suppression has adapted to a new digital environment. The Thai government has adeptly paired new information controls with old repressive methods, giving the state potent capabilities to control dissent. Thailand also demonstrates how digital repression is born from and develops out of internal drivers; external actors exercise limited influence in shaping the state’s digital strategies.

Motivations and Incentives for Digital Repression

This chapter defines digital repression and describes five principal techniques: surveillance, censorship, social manipulation and disinformation, Internet shutdowns, and targeted persecution against online users. It discusses how leaders confront the “dictator’s digital dilemma” (enabling technological innovation while maintaining political control). It addresses whether digital technology is changing the balance between governments and civil society. It examines why certain states employ digital repression but not others and offers two explanations in this regard. Finally, it explores China’s responsibility for the global spread of digital repression and considers whether external or domestic factors are more relevant drivers of these tactics.

Social Manipulation and Disinformation in the Philippines

This chapter examines how, under President Rodrigo Duterte’s leadership, the Philippines government has implemented a unique method of digital repression to advance its political objectives. It focuses on four issues. First, it discusses what set of political factors and governance trends enabled an illiberal populist like Duterte to get elected in the first place. Second, it describes key drivers of digital repression in the Philippines—focusing on social manipulation and disinformation strategies deployed by Duterte’s administration. Third, it explains how digital repression works in the Philippines, outlining the mix of strategies Duterte employs to advance his political objectives. Fourth, it investigates the extent to which outside actors—such as Facebook or the Chinese government—are responsible for enabling the spread of digital repression in the country.

Introduction

This chapter presents the main arguments and framework for the book. It explains how regimes apply a range of digital repression strategies to advance their political objectives. While authoritarian leaders rely far more on digital repression techniques than their democratic counterparts, democracies are also prone to exploiting these tools. In certain countries, digital technology is having a transformative effect on repression. This impact, however, is highly dependent on an array of factors: state capacity, technological sophistication, security force capabilities, and regime type. The chapter describes principal stakeholders in the digital ecosystem and motivations for why leaders pursue repression strategies.