The Wire Staff 
New Delhi: India is mentioned as a country promoting digital authoritarianism in a new report, Unfreedom Monitor, which has analysed the phenomenon worldwide.
The Unfreedom Monitor, a project “to analyse, document, and report on the growing phenomenon of the use of digital communications technology to advance authoritarian practices”, finds India mentioned for discussion in how digital authoritarianism is pushed by the government.
The first 20 countries selected for examination in this Unfreedom Monitor are on the basis of “government type, approach to human rights, including rankings in indexes, and approach to the use of communications and surveillance technologies” and includes India. The other countries are: Brazil, Cameroon, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Hong Kong, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Morocco, Myanmar, Philippines, Russia, Sudan, Tanzania, Turkey, Venezuela and Zimbabwe.
How is ‘digital authoritarianism’ defined?
The term digital authoritarianism is described as the “use of technology to advance repressive political interests.” Also “networked authoritarianism,” coined by Global Voices co-founder Rebecca MacKinnon, “emphasises the idea that people can be co-opted into supporting authoritarian power by participating in networked information systems, for example, by giving up their privacy in order to access services, or by using heavily censored discussion platforms that distort available information.”
The report says that “authoritarian states do not simply want to restrict access to the internet, media and other communications technologies. Many states invest in communications technologies that work to curb freedoms.”
The report looks at incidents, a set of events and how governments have handled those, but mainly, for themes, around data governance, speech, access and information in these countries to get a sense of how free and unfree they are.
The issues with Digital India
States and government-affiliated bodies seek to control information “by shaping information ecosystems, running influence operations, conducting large-scale disinformation campaigns, and engaging in other activities that influence what people know and believe.”
After Brazil’s former president Jair Bolsonaro was linked to a government-funded “digital militia” that spread false news about COVID-19-related topics, India’s prime minister, party and followers find specific and pointed mention by name (page 14), “Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his BJP party and its followers have long used their social media presence to promote their brand and troll religious and political minorities.”
In terms of absence of access to the internet and telecommunications, the report finds the ability of citizens “to engage in civic and political discourse is drastically reduced.” Citing recent examples, after Myanmar’s military coup, the report cites “citizen protests in India,” and the run-up to elections in Tanzania.
Among other ‘narrative frames’ used to curb freedoms, the report finds that “pro-authoritarian frames attempt to justify freedom restrictions as being beneficial to citizens.” The second most common narrative frame in the dataset being “governments must monitor media and social media to ensure political stability and public safety,” which researchers found prominently in India, as well as in Myanmar, Venezuela, Zimbabwe, Russia, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, and Rwanda.
Another “pro-authoritarian frame,” it finds, focusses on vilifying and dehumanising opponents. For example, the narrative that “journalists who criticise the government are enemies of the state,” and the report observes that this narrative has been found in India, other than Zimbabwe, Hungary, El Salvador, India, China (and Hong Kong), Cameroon, Philippines, Rwanda, and Iran. This is linked to justifying “media shutdowns, arrests of journalists, justifications for surveillance, and restrictive media regulation.”
The report also details counters to government moves, as citizens and activists push back and India again finds mention here across incidents of resistance reviewed.
Put together by “Global Voices Advox”, this is the work of researchers across multiple countries. The funding for this project was provided by the Deutsche Welle Academy (DW).
The full report can be read here.