- Georgia State University
Department of Communication
PO Box 5060
Atlanta, GA 30302-5060
Michael Jablonski
Georgia State University, Communication, Graduate Student
- Communication, Media and Cultural Studies, Political Violence and Terrorism, Terrorism, Counter terrorism, Critical Terrorism Studies, and 20 moreTerrorism (Anthropology), International Political Economy, Political Economy, Law, Constitutional Law, Law and Society, Communication and Media Law, Conflict Resolution, Law and Politics, Political communication, Elections, Election Campaigning, Elections and Voting Behavior, Economics, Law and Economics, RF communication, International Relations, Democracy, Election Law, and History of Democracyedit
So much inquiry surrounding the role of the internet in society has been dominated by words like: internet freedom, surveillance, cybersecurity, Edward Snowden and, most prolifically, cyberwar. For many, the term cyber war refers to the... more
So much inquiry surrounding the role of the internet in society has been dominated by words like: internet freedom, surveillance, cybersecurity, Edward Snowden and, most prolifically, cyberwar. For many, the term cyber war refers to the extension of military strategy and conflict into the realm of electronic networks, or more simply, the use of the internet for various forms of covert, forceful attack. Hackers, cybercriminals, and internet activists are the most visible soldiers in this conflict, but, they are secondary.
Behind the rhetoric of cyberwar is an on-going state-centered battle for information resources. This real cyberwar between states is not new; it is as old as the systematic transfer of information across borders. From the invention of the postal service, to the laying of international telegraph and telephone wires, to the rise of international broadcasting, to the modern day roll out of internet and mobile infrastructure, states have been preoccupied with how to leverage information systems for political, economic, and social power. We propose a broader perspective of cyberwar, conceptualized as the utilization of digital networks for geopolitical purposes, including covert attacks against another state’s electronic systems, but also, and more importantly, the variety of ways the internet is used to further a state’s economic and military agendas. In addition to covert attacks, the internet, and the rules that govern it, shape political opinions, consumer habits, cultural mores and values. Unlike revolutionary communication technologies before it, the internet has the potential to be truly global, interoperable and interactive, thus magnifying its significance. The book looks beyond debates on the democratic value of new and emerging information technologies, focusing instead on the political, economic, and geopolitical factors driving internet freedom and control policies.
Ebook available at: https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=pWaZBgAAQBAJ&rdid=book-pWaZBgAAQBAJ&rdot=1&source=gbs_vpt_read&pcampaignid=books_booksearch_viewport
Behind the rhetoric of cyberwar is an on-going state-centered battle for information resources. This real cyberwar between states is not new; it is as old as the systematic transfer of information across borders. From the invention of the postal service, to the laying of international telegraph and telephone wires, to the rise of international broadcasting, to the modern day roll out of internet and mobile infrastructure, states have been preoccupied with how to leverage information systems for political, economic, and social power. We propose a broader perspective of cyberwar, conceptualized as the utilization of digital networks for geopolitical purposes, including covert attacks against another state’s electronic systems, but also, and more importantly, the variety of ways the internet is used to further a state’s economic and military agendas. In addition to covert attacks, the internet, and the rules that govern it, shape political opinions, consumer habits, cultural mores and values. Unlike revolutionary communication technologies before it, the internet has the potential to be truly global, interoperable and interactive, thus magnifying its significance. The book looks beyond debates on the democratic value of new and emerging information technologies, focusing instead on the political, economic, and geopolitical factors driving internet freedom and control policies.
Ebook available at: https://play.google.com/store/books/details?id=pWaZBgAAQBAJ&rdid=book-pWaZBgAAQBAJ&rdot=1&source=gbs_vpt_read&pcampaignid=books_booksearch_viewport
Research Interests: Political Economy, International Communication, Privacy, Information Policy, Internet Governance, and 12 moreSurveillance, International Governance, The Internet, Google, Cyberwarfare, Cyber Security, ICANN, WCIT, NSA analysis, Cultural Imperialism, Global Media, International Communication, WSIS, and Information Sovereignty
Traditional election monitoring involves trained observers recruited and deployed by neutral organizations to complete structured reports based on their first-hand observations. In contrast, social media-based election monitoring takes as... more
Traditional election monitoring involves trained observers recruited and deployed by neutral organizations to complete structured reports based on their first-hand observations. In contrast, social media-based election monitoring takes as input the high volume, noisy data produced by individuals posting on social media outlets, with limited constraints and structure. Trained volunteers process this data in an effort to extract meaningful information. Both methods have been used successfully to support free and fair elections. In this work we begin to explore a middle ground, namely reports by untrained individuals, but mediated through a mobile phone application that provides structure for the responses. In collaboration with Pol-IT, a Buenos Aires based organization focused on politics and ICTs, we report on a first study of users of the Ojo con el Voto (Eyes on the Vote) application deployed during the Argentina presidential runoff election in November 2015. We expect that citizen apps for election monitoring will become increasingly popular, hence this early look at their use offers an opportunity to establish an initial baseline and to potentially influence subsequent development.
Research Interests:
Southern Methodist University Center for Presidential History, Collective Memory Project
Brief history of the use of social media in the 2004 US presidential election.
Brief history of the use of social media in the 2004 US presidential election.
Research Interests:
Southern Methodist University Center for Presidential History, Collective Memory Project
Brief history of the development of 527 Organizations during the the 2004 presidential election.
Brief history of the development of 527 Organizations during the the 2004 presidential election.
Research Interests:
This case study of a nongovernmental organization (NGO) performing public opinion polling examines the role of a non-state actor in public diplomacy. Two polls conducted in Syria during 2010 and 2011 by the Democracy Council employed... more
This case study of a nongovernmental organization (NGO) performing public opinion polling examines the role of a non-state actor in public diplomacy. Two polls conducted
in Syria during 2010 and 2011 by the Democracy Council employed insufficiently rigorous technique to accurately assess commonly held beliefs, leading to a supposition that they constituted tools in a persuasion campaign. The use of poll results by an NGO that may influence perceptions of the Syrian regime complicates public diplomacy. The validity of the polls was tested in two ways. First, comparison of the methodology as described in the poll reports and media statements by the pollsters with standards established by professional polling organizations disclosed significant departures from
generally accepted standards in areas of poll construction, sampling, and analysis. Second, statements made by the pollsters following release of the polls were analyzed
for consistency with the actual poll reports and were via the Google search engine to determine dispersal. The analysis of media reports showed that the pollsters made claims for the polls not supported by their data. The persistence of language taken from the original press report evidenced wide dispersal across the Internet. The failure to adhere to accepted standards, extravagant claims made for the poll, and the diffusion analysis support an inference that the poll was conducted for argumentative purposes.
in Syria during 2010 and 2011 by the Democracy Council employed insufficiently rigorous technique to accurately assess commonly held beliefs, leading to a supposition that they constituted tools in a persuasion campaign. The use of poll results by an NGO that may influence perceptions of the Syrian regime complicates public diplomacy. The validity of the polls was tested in two ways. First, comparison of the methodology as described in the poll reports and media statements by the pollsters with standards established by professional polling organizations disclosed significant departures from
generally accepted standards in areas of poll construction, sampling, and analysis. Second, statements made by the pollsters following release of the polls were analyzed
for consistency with the actual poll reports and were via the Google search engine to determine dispersal. The analysis of media reports showed that the pollsters made claims for the polls not supported by their data. The persistence of language taken from the original press report evidenced wide dispersal across the Internet. The failure to adhere to accepted standards, extravagant claims made for the poll, and the diffusion analysis support an inference that the poll was conducted for argumentative purposes.
Research Interests:
protection and a free and open Internet – has been criticized as being inconsistent at best and hypocritical at worst. Placing US copyright and Internet policy in an historical context and using Susan Strange’s concepts of structural... more
protection and a free and open Internet – has been criticized as being inconsistent at best and hypocritical at worst. Placing US copyright and Internet policy in an historical context and using Susan Strange’s concepts of structural power and knowledge structures, we argue that seeming inconsistencies can be rationalized by examining economic foundations of each policy that promote US business interests. All knowledge regulation policies involve balancing access and restriction, with the specific balance the outcome of path-dependent political and economic forces and subject to political contestation. Our analysis suggests that the current US policy of Internet freedom and strong copyright protection represents a particular, historically situated strategy designed to exert structural power in the global information economy: free flow of information creates markets by exposure to intellectual properties while copyright secures economic benefit from the flow. We argue that a full and honest debate over issues of information access should be discussed in terms of contemporary values drawn from all cultures, with the realization that different societies and interests will privilege access and dissemination differently. Recognizing as legitimate and incorporating these different perspectives into the global governance structures of the Internet is the key challenge facing those who favour truly democratic global Internet governance.
Research Interests:
The French intervention in Mali has been justified in part by using a meme characterizing troubled areas as “lawless regions.” The phrase “lawless regions” signifies areas noncompliant with behavioral standards expected by actors... more
The French intervention in Mali has been justified in part by using a meme characterizing troubled areas as “lawless regions.” The phrase “lawless regions” signifies areas noncompliant with behavioral standards expected by actors extraneous to the region either as divergent from external standards or lacking effective self-government. Using Mali as a case study, but also looking at other havens of alleged lawlessness, this paper contrasts the use of a lawlessness trope with the concept of ungovernable spaces. Lawlessness is not only used to impart legitimacy to intervenors claiming a moral imperative but also serves to demonize insurgents as incongruent to an undefined conceptualization of lawfulness. Unlike an ungoverned space, a lawless region may have political structures that tolerate a culture of rebellion for political or economic gain. Lawlessness occurs in structured space. Conceptualizing a region using terms of insubordinate behavior both resonates with colonialism while differentiating intervention as a police action to enforce laws rather than engaging in nation building. Delineation of geographic lawless space, combined with co-referent networks across North Africa, suggests a network model of distributed threats unconstrained by regional boundaries.
Research Interests:
Governments have reacted to the possibility that the global internet may provide a pathway for intrusion associated with malicious activity by segmenting internal networks such that portions do not interconnect with networks outside their... more
Governments have reacted to the possibility that the global internet may provide a pathway for intrusion associated with malicious activity by segmenting internal networks such that portions do not interconnect with networks outside their control. Networks that function like the internet but with little or no global connectivity – intranets – are seen as ways to protect information from aggression by isolating networked users from dangers lurking on the larger system. Intranets, however, substitute one set of dangers for another. The creation of an intranet fosters a false sense of security while decreasing the probability that malware on the system can be expeditiously detected. Infection of a network in the Natanz nuclear enrichment facility (Iran) by the Stuxnet worm provides a case study demonstrating that intranets distort the protection calculus applicable to networks. The internet derives protection from a large volume of users scanning for malware using a large number of diagnostic tools. An intranet, by contrast, constrains the diversity of techniques employed to monitor network health. Users employing an intranet must weigh assumed benefits of network impenetrability against costs associated with decreased surveillance.
Research Interests:
The Democracy Council, a California NGO, conducted two polls in Syria that assessed popular support for the Assad regime. The surveys were labeled “guerrilla polls” because they relied upon unique methodologies that were thought to... more
The Democracy Council, a California NGO, conducted two polls in Syria that assessed popular support for the Assad regime. The surveys were labeled “guerrilla polls” because they relied upon unique methodologies that were thought to circumvent
restrictions on polling imposed by the government. The survey results, when compiled, were widely distributed as constituting the first scientific assessment in Syria even though multiple surveys had previously and subsequently been concluded by other organizations. Methodological constraints caused the poll to be of limited validity, raising a question as to why it had been performed. A potential answer is that the poll represented a piece of a public diplomacy effort attempting to influence popular attitudes in the country. The strategic use of a poll would be consistent with research on identity formation, which may be a core principle of public diplomacy. The participation of Democracy Council in US government operations supporting dissidents suggests that the polls may have been more of a public diplomacy operation than an assessment of attitudes.
Presented at ISA Annual Convention, San Francisco, April 3rd - 6th, 2013.
restrictions on polling imposed by the government. The survey results, when compiled, were widely distributed as constituting the first scientific assessment in Syria even though multiple surveys had previously and subsequently been concluded by other organizations. Methodological constraints caused the poll to be of limited validity, raising a question as to why it had been performed. A potential answer is that the poll represented a piece of a public diplomacy effort attempting to influence popular attitudes in the country. The strategic use of a poll would be consistent with research on identity formation, which may be a core principle of public diplomacy. The participation of Democracy Council in US government operations supporting dissidents suggests that the polls may have been more of a public diplomacy operation than an assessment of attitudes.
Presented at ISA Annual Convention, San Francisco, April 3rd - 6th, 2013.
Research Interests:
Political change in Egypt during the 2011 Arab Spring accompanied extensive Internet use by organizers of protests resulting in the occupation of Tahrir Square. The events instigated a debate about the importance of social media in... more
Political change in Egypt during the 2011 Arab Spring accompanied extensive Internet use by organizers of protests resulting in the occupation of Tahrir Square. The events instigated a debate about the importance of social media in creating revolutions. This paper argues that the debate should not focus on the relative importance of any particular media technology but should holistically investigate communication through the idea that the various forms were employed as a hybridized system. The paper argues that the focus on a particular technology, such as social media, results from bias toward innovation-centric analysis. A technology-in-use approach emanating from an inquiring into the results sought by users leads to a better understanding of the effect that technology exerts on society.
Presented at the International Studies Association South, Atlanta GA, October 12-14, 2012.
Presented at the International Studies Association South, Atlanta GA, October 12-14, 2012.
Research Interests:
Review of Erwin Chemerinsky's The Case Against the Supreme Court published in the June/July issue of The Atlanta Lawyer.
Research Interests:
This is a short discussion of various bills amending the Voting Rights Act pending in Congress. It was written in support of the Atlanta Bar Association celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the VRA. Published in the August/September... more
This is a short discussion of various bills amending the Voting Rights Act pending in Congress. It was written in support of the Atlanta Bar Association celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the VRA. Published in the August/September 2015 issue of The Atlanta Lawyer.
Research Interests:
Technology constrains human behavior because to use it an actor must comply with restrictions embedded in the technology. A lawyer using social media adheres to praxis and demands of the specific media implementation. Praxis, in... more
Technology constrains human behavior because to use it an actor must comply with restrictions embedded in the technology. A lawyer using social media adheres to praxis and demands of the specific media implementation. Praxis, in particular, may differ from considerations imposed by legal ethics. The resulting situation is not unlike a conflict of laws issue and can be analyzed the same way.
Research Interests:
The decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Commission may augur a sea-change in the law governing campaign finance regulation. This article discusses the statutory... more
The decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Commission may augur a sea-change in the law governing campaign finance regulation. This article discusses the statutory and jurisprudential context in which the SpeechNow.org challenge to federal campaign finance laws developed; presents an overview of the decision of the Court of Appeals; and notes the potential implications of the decision for the future case law addressing the intersection of campaign finance law and the First Amendment.
Research Interests:
Chapter in Georgia Election Law (2006; Athens GA: Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia). Discusses voter registration laws in Georgia. (Much of this material is now outdated and is of historical interest only.)
Research Interests:
Chapter in Georgia Election Law (2008. Athens GA: Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia). Discusses requirements of the Help America Vote Act. (Much of this material is now outdated and is of historical interest only.)
Research Interests:
Review of recent developments in Workers' Compensation Law for the Mercer Law Review (Vol. 33, No. 1. Fall 1981).
Small practice-oriented book published by the Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia in 1994. Out of print and out of date.
Chapter in Georgia Lawyer's Basic Practice Handbook (Athens, GA: Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia. 1990 with updates for 1991, 1992.
Chapter in 1993 version of the Georgia Lawyer's Basic Practice Handbook (Athens, GA: Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia). Updated previous versions of GLBPH and added, at the request of the Georgia Supreme Court, a new... more
Chapter in 1993 version of the Georgia Lawyer's Basic Practice Handbook (Athens, GA: Institute for Continuing Legal Education in Georgia). Updated previous versions of GLBPH and added, at the request of the Georgia Supreme Court, a new section on Alternate Dispute Resolution.
Profile of Roy E. Barnes exploring the significance of a lawyer serving as governor. State Bar of Georgia Journal. Vol. 4, Issue 3. 1998: 10
Report on attempts to preserve the town portion of the New Manchester Historic Site in Sweetwater Creek State Park, Douglas County GA. Published in The Rambler, Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation. Fall/Winter 1985.
Brief history of the New Echota historic site in Gordon County GA. Published in The Rambler (Georgia Trust for Historic Preservation: Spring 1986).
This draft rambles through three ideas: that architecture is a form of media; that the US South in general, and Atlanta in particular, perceived that it was treated as a colony rather than a partner with the rest of the nation; and it... more
This draft rambles through three ideas: that architecture is a form of media; that the US South in general, and Atlanta in particular, perceived that it was treated as a colony rather than a partner with the rest of the nation; and it developed a strategy portraying itself as a global city in order to circumvent perceived restrictions. These hypotheses are explored by longitudinal examination of architects and styles.
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Comments and suggestions are welcome.
Research Interests:
Monroe Price's The Market for Loyalty is a powerful lens for examining international media. This paper attempts to use it in the context of International Political Economy to contextualize public diplomacy. The paper argues that Price's... more
Monroe Price's The Market for Loyalty is a powerful lens for examining international media. This paper attempts to use it in the context of International Political Economy to contextualize public diplomacy. The paper argues that Price's central theoretical ideas have been operationalized in the practice of public diplomacy.