Majority World Initiative Presents Scholarship on Online Propaganda and Social Media
The inaugural cohort of scholars in the Majority World Initiative (MWI) of Yale Law School’s Information Society Project (ISP) has produced eight new publications revealing new ways global social media platforms can be weaponized through online propaganda.
The cohort brings together a community of Majority World scholars to facilitate their engagement with each other. The term “Majority World,” coined by Bangladeshi photographer Shahidul Alam, highlights that the region traditionally known as the Global South, or developing world, encompasses the majority of humankind.
“The Majority World Initiative furthers one of the Yale ISP’s core purposes of fostering a network of brilliant law and technology scholars around the globe,” explained ISP Director Jack Balkin, Knight Professor of Constitutional Law and the First Amendment at Yale Law School.
In 2023-2024, the MWI focused on online propaganda and social media, eliciting academic perspectives from Majority World nations where western social media companies have a significant, but understudied, influence.
“While advocacy and newsgathering from Majority World nations are gaining visibility and influence, they will both benefit if the foundational ideas informing them come from locally embedded scholarship,” said ISP Executive Director Chinmayi Arun, who founded and led the Initiative. “The MWI is directed at encouraging, supporting, and amplifying this scholarship.”
The inaugural cohort of eight MWI scholars participated in in-person and online workshops tailored toward building relationships among them. Their fellowship culminated in the publication of their research on online propaganda from their perspectives on the ISP website.
Agustina del Campo, Professor of International Human Rights and Internet and Human Rights Law at Universidad de Palermo, wrote about rethinking regulating disinformation by focusing on the role of sources, while Kenyan researcher Nanjala Nyabola reflected on the role of regulators more broadly within the majority world.
Yohannes Eneyew Ayalew, a Sessional Academic at Monash University, Australia and former Lecturer in Law at School of Law, Bahir Dar University, Ethiopia, discussed online propaganda and internal armed conflict, including the Tigray War in Ethiopia, and Carlos Affonso Souza, Professor at the Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (UERJ), analyzed disinformation and election integrity in Brazil, focusing on the Bolsonaro government’s practices.
Vietnamese scholar Dang Nguyen, who is a Research Fellow at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision Making & Society at RMIT University, Australia, wrote about automated media systems and how they enable actors in Vietnam and Cambodia to disseminate disinformation about Myanmar. Hanani Hlomani, who was a Research Fellow at Research ICT Africa and a Cyberlaw Lecturer at the University of Cape Town during this project, discussed decentralizing social media in Africa.
Indian scholar Siddharth Narrain, lecturer at the Adelaide Law School, University of Adelaide, Australia, wrote about online propaganda and weaponization of hate speech in India, and Sinta Dewi Rosadi, professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Padjadjaran, Bandung, Indonesia, explained how generative AI and deepfakes are used for what is locally termed a “black campaign” during elections in Indonesia.
“It is an honor for me to be a part of an initiative that centers on research from the Majority World,” said Salwa Hoque, the Initiative’s inaugural director, who executed work leading to these publications. “As part of the MWI, the cohort collectively noted the issues and strategies that many Majority World nations share across the globe as well as the critical difference within each context.”
This winter, the Yale ISP will announce its first MWI resident fellowship, made possible by generous support from the Future of Online Trust and Safety Fund.
The Information Society Project is an intellectual center at Yale Law School founded in 1997. It supports a community of interdisciplinary scholars who explore issues at the intersection of law, technology, and society.
