At the 10th anniversary of the Arab Spring, one question that remains unanswered is whether the use of social media presaged today’s world of rampant disinformation, coordinated online trolls, and weaponized information. While protestors’ use of the internet during the revolutions initially caught most governments flat-footed, manipulating information to maintain domestic control is increasingly commonplace. In this virtual event March 10, the Atlantic Council explored how social media evolved over the course of a single decade from a symbol of hope to a tool for manipulation. Speakers and their affiliations are listed below:
Rasha A. Abdulla: Professor, Journalism and Mass Communication Department, The American University in Cairo (AUC)
Andy Carvin: Resident Senior Fellow and Managing Director, DFRLab, Atlantic Council
Borzou Daragahi: Nonresident Senior Fellow, Middle East Programs, Atlantic Council
Tuqa Nusairat (moderator): Deputy Director, Rafik Hariri Center and Middle East Programs, Atlantic Council
The Age of Innocence
A common theme among all of the panelists was the innocent nature of social media in the early days of the Arab Spring. This innocence extended to both governments’ conceptions of the internet and activists’ uses of it. As Carvin noted, governments were initially naive about the revolutionary potential of the internet. As a result, early attempts to repress activists during the Arab Spring often took the form of traditional violence and coercion rather than the manipulation of digital spaces, reflecting a lack of concern that the internet and social media could be a significant mobilizing force. Abdulla echoed these sentiments. She relayed an anecdote frequently shared about the Mubarak regime in Egypt during the first demonstrations against the Egyptian government, when members of the regime stated that they would “let the kids play” with social media and the internet.
Innocence regarding the nature of the internet likewise extended to activists themselves. Daragahi pointed to the open nature of the internet in 2011, in which activists posted statements on social media using their real names. Carvin similarly recalled speaking with a Tunisian activist in 2011 who extolled the virtues of having her/his name associated with online comments. Both panelists contrasted this early use of the internet for activism with more recent years, in which activists have increasingly gravitated towards pseudonyms and encrypted telecommunications, where the risk of repression is substantially lower.
The Rise of Coordinated Disinformation
As governments became more aware of the power of the internet and social media to destabilize their hold on power, they began to develop increasingly sophisticated methods for maintaining control over the information environment. Carvin commented on the ability of regimes to adapt new, more effective methods for exploiting the digital sphere. The first instance of regime counter-responses to digital activism occurred in Syria in 2011, where the Assad regime used bots to amplify random stories about Syria that crowded out activists’ tweets. In Saudi Arabia, the government used real people to push propaganda and pro-government narratives rather than bots. Throughout the region, governments have become more adept at crowding out activists from social media or identifying and targeting opposition voices.
Carvin suggested that one of the most insidious recent developments in disinformation has been the growth of private firms available for hire that will create disinformation campaigns on demand. He specifically pointed to a Tunisian firm that has created disinformation to support multiple political candidates in Togo, Cote d’Ivoire, and Tunisia, but he noted that the degree to which these firms exist and the scale of their disinformation networks is as yet largely unknown. Abdulla also identified social media platforms as playing a role in crowding out activist voices. She especially condemned the practice of ghost-banning, in which platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram decrease the visibility of certain users. This process is particularly problematic because it occurs with no transparency and is often difficult to identify at all.
While governments have learned to more effectively control digital spaces, Daragahi stressed that the use of social media and the internet is only one facet of activism. Ultimately, the ability to mobilize on the streets and the desire to effect change upon the world are far more consequential determinants of political change.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
– I’ve regularly sent around the Military Times polls of service people on political questions. Their methodology makes the results suggestive rather than certain, but it is surprising to see the drop in support for Trump compared with 4 years ago.
– I’ve never worked in the Pentagon building. [My two summers with the Navy Dept were in the old Main Navy on Constitution Ave.] So I was surprised to read about how technologically “retrograde” the building is.
1. Tunisia: Justice in Transition | Tuesday, October 2, 2018 | 9:30 am – 11:30 am | Carnegie Endowment for International Peace | 1779 Massachusetts Avenue, NW, Washington, DC 20036 | Register Here
Please join the Carnegie Middle East Program for a screening of the documentary, Tunisia: Justice in Transition. The film tracks the trajectory of Tunisia’s Truth and Dignity Commission, established in 2013 to address the crimes of the Ben Ali and Bourguiba regimes. It includes interviews with victim’s families, human rights activists, and political actors to explain the Commission’s rocky path over the past five years.
Following the screening, Sarah Yerkes will moderate a discussion on the status of transitional justice in Tunisia today with one of the film’s creators, Ricard Gonzalez, and Salwa El Gantri.
Speakers:
Salwa El Gantri is the head of Tunisia Office for the International Center for Transitional Justice. She is an expert in gender and transitional justice, and has more than twelve years of experience in the democracy, human rights, and transitional justice fields.
Ricard Gonzalez is a journalist and political scientist. He has worked as a correspondent in Washington, DC, Cairo, and Tunis for El Mundo, El País, and Ara.
Sarah Yerkes is a fellow is a fellow in Carnegie’s Middle East Program, where her research focuses on Tunisia’s political, economic, and security developments as well as state-society relations in the Middle East and North Africa.
2. Is Russia Becoming Central Asia’s Near Abroad? | Tuesday, October 2, 2018 | 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm | Wilson Center | 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20004 | Register Here
Russia’s relationship to Central Asia has always been distinctive and ambiguous, in contrast to its attitude toward both Ukraine and the Caucasus. Only in the twentieth century did it develop a deep sense of mission there, and then only at the hands of a small number of ideologues.
Today, Central Asia is fast recovering its traditional regional spirit, which increasingly impacts its former imperial ruler. As this happens, Russia, while remaining a force to be reckoned with in Central Asia, is also becoming an object of Central Asian geopolitical and cultural influence. Hence the notion of Russia as Central Asia’s “near abroad.”
The talk will be a Distinguished Speaker Lecture with S. Frederick Starr, Founding Chairman of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program and a Professor at John Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.
3. China’s Alliance with North Korea and the Soviet Union: A Conversation with China’s Leading Historians | Thursday, October 4, 2018 | 3:30 pm – 5:00 pm | Wilson Center | 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20004 | Register Here
The Wilson Center’s History and Public Policy Program will be hosting China’s three leading diplomatic historians for a discussion about the history and present day relevance of China’s Cold War-era relations with North Korea and the Soviet Union.A Misunderstood Friendship: Mao Zedong, Kim Il-sung, and Sino-North Korean Relations, 1949–1976, co-authored by Dr. Zhihua Shen and Dr. Yafeng Xia, is the first book-length history of the China-DPRK relationship to appear in English. Shen and Xia draw on previously untapped primary source materials to offer a unique account of the China-North Korean relationship, uncovering tensions and rivalries that shed new light on the ties between these two Communist East Asian nations. They unravel the twists and turns in high-level diplomacy between China and North Korea from the late 1940s to the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, and reveal that the tensions that currently plague the alliance between the two countries have been present from the very beginning of the relationship.
Mao and the Sino–Soviet Split, 1959-1973: A New History, co-authored by Dr. Danhui Li and Dr. Yafeng Xia, synthesizes over 20 years of research on the subject by the authors and offers a comprehensive look at the Sino-Soviet split from 1959, when visible cracks appeared in the Sino-Soviet alliance, to 1973, when China’s foreign policy changed from an “alliance with the Soviet Union to oppose the United States” to “aligning with the United States to oppose the Soviet Union.”
The authors will be joined by commentator Dr. Gregg A. Brazinksy and moderator Dr. Christian Ostermann
Speakers:
Zhihua Shen is the director of the Center for Cold War International History Studies at East China Normal University, Shanghai, and the author of a number of major Chinese-language works on Cold War history.
Danhui Li is Professor of History at Institute for Studies of China’s Neighboring Countries and Regions, East China Normal University, editor-in-chief of two academic journals: Lengzhan guojishi yanjiu (Cold War International History Studies), and Bianjiang yu zhoubian wenti yanjiu (Studies of Borderlands and Neighboring Regions). A leading authority on CCP’s external relations during the Cold War, she has published extensively on Sino-Soviet relations and Sino-Vietnamese relations during the Indochina War (in Chinese, Russian and English).
Yafeng Xia is Professor of History at Long Island University in New York and Senior Research Fellow, Institute for Studies of China’s Neighboring Countries and Regions at East China Normal University in Shanghai. A former Wilson Center fellow and public policy scholar, he is the author of numerous books on Chinese Cold War history.
Gregg A. Brazinsky is professor of history and international affairs at The George Washington University. He is the author of Winning the Third World: Sino-American Rivalry during the Cold War (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 2017), and of Nation Building in South Korea: Korean, Americans, and the Making of a Democracy (Chapel Hill: UNC Press, 2007).
4. LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media (DC Launch) | Thursday, October 4, 2018 | 12:00 pm – 2:00 pm | New America Foundation | 740 15th St NW #900 Washington, D.C. 20005 | Register Here
In an age of livestreamed terrorist attacks and viral misinformation, a new pocket-sized battleground has emerged.
Through the weaponization of social media, the internet has transformed war and politics. Terrorists livestream their attacks, “Twitter wars” produce real world casualties, and viral misinformation alters not just the result of battles, but the very fate of nations.
In their new book LikeWar: The Weaponization of Social Media, authors Peter W. Singer and Emerson T. Brooking study what social media has been doing to politics, news, and war around the world, drawing upon everything from historic cases to the latest in AI and machine intelligence. They track dozens of conflicts in every corner of the globe, studying the spread of YouTube battle clips, a plague of Nazi-sympathizing cartoon frogs, and even enlist in a digital army themselves.
Join New America for a conversation moderated by Anne-Marie Slaughter, President and CEO of the Foundation, with the authors as they tackle the questions that arose during their five years of research: What can be kept secret in a world of networks? Does social media expose the truth or bury it? And what role do ordinary people now play in international conflicts?
5. Yemen’s Path Forward | Thursday, October 4th, 2018 | 1:00 pm – 4:00 pm | Middle East Institute | 529 14th St NW Washington, DC 20045 | Register Here
Three years into Yemen’s civil war, the country continues to see severe humanitarian devastation, widespread food insecurity, and lack of economic access, against the backdrop of an increasingly complex geopolitical environment. An intensification of fighting in Hodeidah and elsewhere in the country has added to the human costs of the conflict and threatens to become catastrophic. Increasingly, Yemenis are war-weary and anxious to see progress on the UN-led negotiating process intended to end the fighting and restore the peaceful transition interrupted three years ago.
The Middle East Institute (MEI) is pleased to host a half-day conference to assess the priorities for ending the conflict and scenarios to move forward. This conference will convene two panels and a keynote address to assess urgent priorities and potential pathways forward for Yemen.
Speakers:
Bruce Abrams assumed duties as deputy assistant administrator in USAID’s Middle East Bureau in January 2017. His portfolio includes USAID programs in Yemen, Tunisia, Morocco, Libya, the technical support team and the Middle East Regional Platform. Abrams joined the Middle East bureau after serving as deputy mission director in USAID Zimbabwe.
Sama’a Al-Hamdani is an independent researcher and analyst focusing on Yemen. She is currently a visting fellow at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies (CCAS) at Georgetown University and a research fellow at the Sana’a Center for Strategic Studies (SCSS). Al-Hamdani is also the director of the Yemen Cultural Institute for Heritage and the Arts (YCIHA), a nonprofit based in Washington DC dedicated to Yemeni arts and heritage.
Marcia Biggs is a special correspondent for PBS NewsHour, for whom she has recently won a Gracie Allen Award, a First Place National Headliner Award, and a New York Festivals World Medal. Her expertise lies in the Arab world, with over a decade of experience in the Middle East, five years of which were spent living in Lebanon. Most recently, she became one of the few television journalists to cover the crisis in Yemen, which she did in a four part series for PBS, “Inside Yemen.”
Ambassador Ahmed Awad Bin Mubarak assumed his duties as the ambassador of the Republic of Yemen to the United States in August 2015. Formerly, Ambassador Bin Mubarak was the director of the presidential office and chief of staff. Prior to taking up his appointment as the director, Ambassador Bin Mubarak was appointed on January 2013 secretary general of Yemen’s National Dialogue Conference (NDC), leading a team of over 120 staff facilitating the mediation process among the participating 565 delegates, and providing technical assistance to NDC working groups.
Amb. (ret.) Gerald Feierstein is director for government relations, policy and programs at MEI. He retired from the U.S. Foreign Service in May 2016 after a 41-year career with the personal rank of career minister. As a diplomat he served in nine overseas postings, including three tours of duty in Pakistan, as well as assignments in Saudi Arabia, Oman, Lebanon, Jerusalem, and Tunisia. In 2010, President Obama appointed Amb. Feierstein U.S. Ambassador to Yemen, where he served until 2013. From 2013 until his retirement, Amb. Feierstein was principal deputy assistant secretary of State for Near Eastern affairs.
Latifa Jamel is the chairperson of Justice for Women and Children. Originally from Taiz, she is a Yemeni journalist and political activist. She served as board members in Yemen Aid, International Council of Rights and Freedoms, and Yemeni American Coalition. She previously worked as an academic advisor and head of Social Studies department in local schools within Taiz.
Timothy Lenderking is the deputy assistant secretary of state for Arabian Gulf affairs in the Near East Bureau at the U.S. Department of State. He is a career member of the senior Foreign Service. Lenderking served previously as the deputy chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, from 2013-2016. He served as the director of the Pakistan office at the Department of State from 2010-2013. From 2008-2010, Lenderking completed two tours in Baghdad, the first as the senior democracy advisor at the US Embassy, and the second as the policy advisor to LTG Charles Jacoby, Commanding General of Multi-National Forces Iraq (MNF-I), based at Camp Victory.
6. The Limits of Punishment: Transitional Justice and Violent Extremism | Friday, October 5th, 2018 | 10:30 am – 12:00 pm | Brookings Institution | 1775 Massachusetts Ave. NW Washington, DC 20036 | Register Here
In countries where jihadi groups have gained control over territory and populations, states face the challenge of dealing with individuals accused of association with those groups. Governments have too often responded in heavy-handed ways, penalizing broad segments of local populations suspected of having supported the group, often on the basis of thin or non-existent evidence. Such excessively punitive and dragnet approaches risk backfiring by exacerbating local grievances, conflating victims with perpetrators, and laying the groundwork for future violence.
On October 5, the Foreign Policy program at Brookings and the United Nations University’s Centre for Policy Research (UNU-CPR) will present a discussion of alternative strategies and justice issues for countries affected by jihadi violence. Experts will present the findings of three fieldwork-based case studies of Nigeria, Somalia, and Iraq, which analyze these states’ approaches to accountability and rehabilitation of Boko Haram, al-Shabab, and Islamic State affiliates. Panelists will also discuss the potential application of transitional justice tools; conditional amnesties; defectors programs; and disarmament, demobilization, and rehabilitation approaches to transitions away from conflict in such settings.
Panelists will include Lana Baydas, an independent human rights expert; Vanda Felbab-Brown, senior fellow with the Center for 21st Century Security and Intelligence at Brookings; and Cale Salih, research officer at UNU-CPR. Landry Signé, a David M. Rubenstein Fellow in the Africa Growth Initiative at Brookings, will provide introductory remarks and moderate the discussion. After the program, panelists will take questions from the audience.
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