Digital Humour, Gag Laws, and the Liberal Security State

This chapter presents a case study of Facu Diaz, a Spanish satirist whose on-line ridicule of the Spanish government created a political furor that brought him before the courts. The chapter engages the problem of the criminalization of political dissent by liberal states in the digital age. The case highlights how digital media is now being used to create content for satire, as well as to replicate and infiltrate more traditional political and media forums, changing many traditional forms of political practice. The case [points to some of the central problems inherent in liberalism which may give reason to curb the enthusiasm of those who think that new digital media creates fresh opportunities for augmenting the ‘public sphere'. It is argued that liberalism as a political theory and ethos, tends to be blind to non-traditional political expressions like satire and other artistic work. In addition, the expansion of security laws in many countries suggests, liberalism's ostensible commitment to freedom needs to be reframed by recalling its historical preoccupation with security.

Influence of Social Networking Sites on Civic Participation in Higher Education Context

This book chapter introduces the debate on youth civic participation specifically looking at the benefits in the higher educational context. This chapter promotes the recent level and character of using the social networking sites and their possibility to admit for the growth of higher education towards student civic participation. The chapter also reviews the recent studies on the civic uses of the social networking sites and argues the learning methods and consequences that could be practiced by learners and instructors when using the social networking sites for civic participation. Hence, the Bandura's social cognitive theory and cognitive engagement theory will be applied to create the framework for exploring the influence of civic efficacy and knowledge, access to civic information on the social networking sites, and civic interest on the association between the social networking sites and youth civic participation. It helps in recognizing the motivation that inspires the youth online civic participation actions in the higher educational settings.

Youth Online Cultural Participation and Bilibili

This chapter examines one of the most popular youth open platform and video site in China, Bilibili, in which instant, bullet-commenting technology is built in to enhance the participation of the online users. Facilitated by this specific interactive technology, the new form of online commenting system embedded on Bilibili allows members to post and share videos—from self-created ones to illegal Japanese animation—and to engage other participants on an equal basis. As a subcultural space, Bilibili enables youth to organize their own community. In addition, it provides the technological infrastructure for the youths to play with certain form of public discussions. In careful examination of youth cultural practice and its wrestling with commercial force particularly, this study argues that the carnivalesque in a subcultural territory, though a de-politicalized public space, embrace potentials of cultural and political resistance toward capitals and dominant power by ways of poaching and transcoding them into their own subcultural context through online chatting and comments.

Transnational Activism of Young Spanish Emigrants and Uses of ICT

This chapter analyses the transnational collective action of Spanish emigrants in the countries of destination and origin, from appropriations of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT). In the conceptual framework of migrant transnationalism, we approach the collective action and communication, the experience of network activism and the use of ICTs by the transnational Spanish collective Marea Granate (MG), created in 2013, with the aim of intervening in in the discourses of the Spanish government, regarding: a) the Spanish migration; and b) their rights abroad. The focus is on MG´s four collective actions on the voting rights of Spanish emigrants, applying a qualitative methodology. In the conclusions, a transnational activism is observed, with actions mediated and unmediated by ICTs, where Spanish emigrants denounce and mobilize, causing rearrangements in the sociopolitical spaces between States and citizens.

Digital Democracy in Authoritarian Russia

Digital media is expected to promote political participation in government. Around the world, from the United States to Europe, governments have been implementing e-government (use of of the Internet to make bureaucracy more efficient) and promising e-democracy (increased political participation by citizens). Does digital media enable citizens to participate more easily in government, or can authoritarian governments interfere with citizens' ability to speak freely and obtain information? This study of digital media in Russia will show that while digital media can be used by Russian citizens to gain information and express opinions, Kremlin ownership of print media, along with censorship laws and Internet surveillance, can stifle the growth of digital democracy. Though digital media appears to hold promise for increasing citizen participation, this study will show that greater consideration needs to be given to the power of authoritarian governments to suppress civic discourse on the Internet.

Smartphone Guns Shooting Tweets

This chapter investigates the increasing use of social media during a 2012 flare up in armed conflict between Hamas and the state of Israel. Through tweet and counter tweet, Israel, Hamas, and digital recruits engage in a duel as lethal to identity as kinetic projectiles. Internet connected devices such as smartphones have become hostile agents through the republishing of social media content. Such devices and social media content have material affects beyond the geographic battlespace. The advent of Internet connected devices and social media content concomitant with their use during armed conflict by hostiles beyond the geographic battlespace suggest that patterns of conflict are rapidly changing calling into question the notion of hostile, hostile acts, and battlespace. In a social media and smartphone saturated era, who and what counts as hostile (people, smartphones, and tweets) is increasingly ambiguous.

Empowering Citizens Through Virtual and Alternate Reality

2016 is the year when virtual and augmented reality takes a boost. We've already seen various Virtual reality (VR) headsets being released and Microsoft new Hololens is finally being realised thus paving the way for Augmented Realities (AR). In this chapter, we will explore further the use of VR in two particular domains in which governments are facing difficulties. The first topic is related to disorders and in the second domain we will consider migration. We will do this by creating new VR experiences, which present to the users alternative realities. The context we will be looking at is that of teacher training. As teaches they cannot fully comprehend what an autistic child or a child migrant experiences simply because they haven't lived through that experience themselves. Thus we have created an innovative inter-faculty collaboration at the University of Malta aimed at addressing this challenge. Previous studies into the importance of VR for teaching and learning, have described the ways in which people immersed in this alternative reality have been affected.

E-Government and E-Democracy in the Supranational Arena

Several scholars have argued about the nature of the democratic (and legitimacy) deficit that affects the European Union (EU) and its political institutions. The creation of a European public sphere and the enhancement of a European “we feeling” among citizens has been considered a fundamental feature to implement the democratic functioning of the EU. In this context of democratic deficit, it is interesting to understand and analyse the role of the e-government in the EU, in order to understand if new technologies could be useful to implement transparency and accountability within the supranational arena and reduce the gap between citizens and institutions. This gap is one of the core elements that are feeding the democratic and legitimacy deficit of the EU. The main task of the chapter is to analyse the actual state of e-government and e-democracy in the EU, and reflect if these tools are reducing the democratic deficit that is effecting EU institutions.

Technoethics and Digital Democracy for Future Citizens

In a digital democracy, education should help foster the development of ethically, socially, and ecologically responsible citizens capable of living autonomously and harmoniously within a networked society. Unfortunately, contemporary digital technology, communication media and education tend to give rise to conformity, individual satisfaction, and short-term goal seeking. Overcoming current obstacles requires modifying current values and strategies to better align digital technology use with democratic ideals and the capacity for harmonious long-term survival. This paper presents a technoethical systems perspective to help disentangle core threats to digital democracy and to highlight selected educational and communication tools needed to leverage future citizens within a digital democracy.

Digital Media, Civic Literacy, and Civic Engagement

It has been asserted that digital media can improve literacy, engagement, and activism so long as it is promoted and judiciously encouraged by state, political, and societal actors committed to expanding the scope of policy-making to those that otherwise feel ‘left-out'. More specifically, it has been averred that social media, ‘clicktivism,' and electronic referendums have the potential to educate and energize voters on the day-to-day challenges that confront government, and give them a direct say into how certain issues ought to be addressed. However, this chapter argues that while there are still good reasons to be optimistic, looking forward, we also need to critically appraise the false promise(s) of digital media, and do so in a more nuanced fashion. It will be suggested that Canada's comparably low civic literacy rates provide us with some insight into the underlying perils of plebiscitarianism should a more sincere form digital empowerment prevail. It will also be argued that political institutions, culture, Internet usage, populism should also be accounted for.