Blog
Building Resilience for Terrorism Researchers
September 19, 2018
Read in German Read in French Read in Spanish By Peter King When the so-called Islamic State ramped up its media operation in the summer of 2014 to promote its territorial advances across Iraq and Syria, terrorism researchers who had been in the business for a decade or more were forced to take a step ...
News
New Report Investigates Increasing Levels of Online Polarisation and its Effects on Hate Speech
September 13, 2018
VOX-Pol has released its latest report in the VOX-Pol publication series, titled Horizons Of Hate: A Comparative Approach to Social Media Hate Speech, authored by Matti Pohjonen, on 11 September 2018. About the Report In the report, Pohjonen employs a comparative approach to social media hate speech. The study compares a Finnish anti-refugee and anti-immigration Facebook ...
Blog
The Ethics of Academia-Counter-Terrorism Police Collaboration
September 12, 2018
By Mike Edwards My belief in the value of collaboration between police and academics stems from a policing conference on domestic violence, stalking and sexual violence that I attended as a young police officer. Criminal behavioural analyst Laura Richards delivered the keynote speech. This sparked a personal interest in human behavioural analysis and specialist criminal ...
Blog
Ethics is Method, Method is Ethics: What Terrorism Researchers Should Know
September 5, 2018
By Carol Winkler One of the attendees at the recent Ethics of Terrorism Research workshop held at Swansea University poignantly observed, “ethics is method, method is ethics.” This rich concept has various implications for how terrorism researchers should think about their work. To start such a conversation, I will revisit Simon Cottee and Jack Cunliffe’s ...
Home Slider Newsletter
VOX-Pol Newsletter 5(3) August 2018
August 15, 2018
Welcome to Vol. 5 Iss. 3 of the VOX-Pol Newsletter. If you have colleagues or friends who may be interested in the content of our newsletter, or any events or research carried out by VOX-Pol, please forward this to them and encourage them to subscribe via our website. In particular, please update any interested colleagues about ...
News
Third Biennial Conference Keynote Speaker
August 2, 2018
We are delighted to have Mina al-Lami as the keynote speaker at our upcoming conference in August. Mina al-Lami heads the long-established team of online jihadism experts at BBC Monitoring (BBCM). She is the editor of BBCM’s Jihadism page that features daily reports and insight on jihadist developments, trends, profiles and online platforms. Her team relies on meticulous ...
News
Amsterdam Conference Programme Published; Registration Still Open
July 27, 2018
VOX-Pol’s third biennial conference is fast approaching and will take place at the University of Amsterdam on 20 – 21 August 2018, with post-conference workshops taking place on 22 August 2018. Below are some key pieces of information relating to the upcoming event. CONFERENCE PROGRAMME The full conference programme, including keynote, book launch, and 17 panels, is now ...
Blog
Germany’s Legal Crackdown on Social Media: Four Misconceptions Dispelled
July 25, 2018
By Stefan Theil Germany’s infamous network enforcement law – which seeks to more heavily regulate social media – came into force at the start of 2018 to almost unanimous criticism. That is unfortunate, because I believe the law is a risk worth taking and can serve as a good starting point for governments considering tougher regulations ...
Blog
Tommy Robinson and the UK’s Post-EDL Far Right: How Extremists are Mobilising in Response to Online Restrictions and Developing a New ‘Victimisation’ Narrative
July 18, 2018
By William Allchorn The 9th of June saw one of the most prominent far-right mobilisations of the year. Assembling in Trafalgar Square, hundreds of demonstrators turned out to protest the arrest and imprisonment of former English Defence League (EDL) leader, Tommy Robinson (real name Stephen Christopher Yaxley Lennon), for contempt of court after he broadcast live ...
Blog
Artificial Intelligence and the Future of Online Content Moderation
July 11, 2018
By Nick Feamster This post contains reflections from a Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society workshop on the use of artificial intelligence in governing communication online that took place earlier this year [Ed.] Context In the United States and Europe, many platforms that host user content, such as Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter, have enjoyed safe harbor protections for the ...