Abstract
Social media has been a crucial online space, yet our comprehension of government censorship remains limited by insufficient research. This study addresses this scholarly gap by probing two key inquiries: censorship’s motives and evolutionary course. An analysis of 360 censorship incidents from 2006 to 2023 across 76 countries examines three primary rationales: political, social, and security, with political motives prevailing. The reasons for censorship vary across platforms and years, with political and social factors predominantly impacting Facebook and YouTube, while security concerns notably affect TikTok and Telegram. Regional disparities in censorship underscore the prevalence of political motives in Asia and Africa, social factors in South Asia and the MENA region, and security concerns in North America, Europe, and Oceania—the entirety of the Western world. The escalating social media censorship, particularly driven by political and social considerations since 2015, underscores a broader trend of dwindling democracy and burgeoning digital authoritarianism globally. We presume that a nation’s democratic environment indicates its social media censorship practices, suggesting the nexus of local and global politics with technology complicates the understanding of social media censorship.
Key-words: social media, governmental censorship, internet, online, freedom of speech
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To cite this article: Md. Sayeed Al-Zaman, Mridha Md. Shiblee Noman, Rise of Digital Authoritarianism? Exploring Global Motivations Behind Governmental Social Media Censorship, Javnost – The Public, 31(4), pp. 529-544, 2024. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13183222.2024.2396211
