Welcome to Volume 11, Issue 6 of the monthly VOX-Pol Newsletter.
VOX-Pol AT TASM
The Terrorism and Social Media (TASM) conference takes place in the Great Hall on Swansea University’s Bay Campus on 18 and 19 June 2024. VOX-Pol is a co-organiser of the conference, please visit our stand and say hello!
UPCOMING VOX-Pol WORKSHOP
A reminder for the VOX-Pol virtual workshop, taking place on Thursday 13 June on the topic of Borderline Online Content. More information and registration is at the link.
The workshop will feature:
- Heidi Schulze & Simon Greipl “A Little Less Hate, But a Lot More Harm – Fear Speech as Strategic Borderline Communication”
- Hannah Rose: “Hybridised Online Hate and Extremism in the Israel/Gaza Conflict”
- Ursula Schmid “Legitimizing hostility through humor: Perceptions and effects of humorous hate speech on social media”
- Broderick McDonald “Lawful but Awful: Borderline Content and Human Rights”
RECENT EVENTS
VOX-Pol Member Dr. Stephane Baele spoke at the The International Centre for Counter-Terrorism (ICCT) annual conference on 28 and 29 May, on the topic of AI and Online Extremism. Click for a report, video, and photos of the conference. That same week, Stephane also spoke at the American Academy in Berlin and Anti-Defamation League joint conference on antisemitic and conspiracy theories, on the topic of conspiracy theories and online extremism.
VOX-Pol Member Professor Maura Conway presented at the ‘EU versus Crime‘ conference co-organised by Europol and the European Commission. This event kicked off Europol’s 25th anniversary year. Prof Conway spoke on the panel Shaping the Future: Counteracting Terrorism and Radicalisation in the Digital Age. The discussion covered the topics of online radicalisation, encrypted messaging platforms, current threats and future directions. The panel can be watched at this YouTube link.
RECENT PUBLICATIONS
Stephane Baele published an article in the International Studies Review titled AI IR: Charting International Relations in the Age of Artificial Intelligence.
VOX-Pol member Heidi Schulze, along with other presenters at the next VOX-Pol Workshop, have published the article “You are doomed!” Crisis-specific and Dynamic Use of Fear Speech in Protest and Extremist Radical Social Movements in the Journal of Quantitative Description: Digital Media.
2024 VOX-Pol PUBLICATIONS
So far in 2024, VOX-Pol has published three reports:
- AI Extremism: Technology, Tactics, Actors (2024) Baele, S. and Brace, L.
- Online Jihadist Propaganda Dissemination Strategies (2024) Macdonald, S. and McCafferty, S.
- The Last Twitter Census (2024) Berger, J.M.
All VOX-Pol Publications are available in full and for free on our Publications page. Some can also be requested in print, HERE.
NEW FROM THE VOX-Pol BLOG
Articles from the last month on the VOX-Pol Blog:
- Male-supremacy as a violent political ideology, 5 June 2024, by Shannon Zimmerman.
- Seeing Eye to Eye: Recognising the ‘Public’ as a Stakeholder in Multistakeholder Initiatives, 29 May 2024, by Connor Rees.
- Two Harms of Hate Speech and the Limits of Counter-Speech, 22 May 2024, by Sam Jackson.
- ‘News overload’: how a constant stream of violent images affects your brain, 15 May 2024, by Francisco Javier Saavedra Macías.