The political economy of digital repression

Abstract

How can we explain why governments become more repressive and the lack of public resistance? With this dissertation, I offer several explanations. First, technological progress leads to new tools of repression that do not suffer from the same drawbacks as their predecessors but, on the contrary, have positive externalities that contribute to authoritarian stability. Second, media manipulation helps build public support for digital governance, which in turn increases the repressive capacity of regimes. Even without media manipulation, and regardless of the institutional context, digital and algorithmic governance faces very little resistance. Third, propaganda can be used strategically and is effective in shaping attitudes and behavior (beyond support for individual policies). This goes as far as persuading people to avoid sanctions on war-critical goods - in the case of Kazakhstanis trading with Russia. Fourth, new digital surveillance tools offer the dual functionality of monitoring society for and deterring overt dissent. Digital surveillance thus limits the potential for anti-government action while not requiring the same level of supporting bureaucracy, and having the side effects and costs as its analog predecessor. These findings are discussed in light of the development of contemporary societies. As such, this dissertation contributes to the literature on (the political economy of) digital authoritarianism, and many subfields to which the individual chapters relate.