Ben O'Loughlin to present at Australia National University, 25 October 2012

Ben O'Loughlin is giving a presentation this Thursday 25 October in the Department of International Relations at Australia National University. His paper is entitled, Strategic Narratives and Power Transition: Communicating a New Order. The paper is based on a forthcoming book on Strategic Narratives with Alister Miskimmon and Laura Roselle. Details of the seminar are below. Thanks to Sarah Logan and Matthew Davies for organising the event.

Strategic Narratives and Power Transition: Communicating a New Order

Professor Ben O'Loughlin

05:00pm - 06:30pm
25 October 2012
Seminar Room 3, Hedley Bull Centre (130), Garran Road, ANU

Abstract

This presentation explains how strategic narratives play a vital role in defining international order and power transition. The analysis of power transition has been dominated by studies focusing on material conditions (Gilpin 1981; Organski 1958), changes in balance of power (Waltz 1979; Kennedy 1988) and more recently the evolution of a liberal order (Ikenberry 2011). Today, a changing distribution of material power will be reflected in greater challenges for great powers to project strategic narratives about the future of the international system, signs of which we are already witnessing. Power transition now occurs in the conditions of a global media ecology in which states must narrate to multiple audiences; this more transparent order affects how states achieve legitimacy for their narrative. A strategic narrative framework can help analysts account for the social, ideational and relational dimensions of power transition neglected in traditional theories. Analysis of the formation, projection and domestic and international reception of China's strategic narrative shows that while China might become a superpower in material terms, its ability to gain legitimacy for an alternative vision of world order is constrained. Its narrative must work against a range of prior understandings of China and of the international system itself. The current rise of the BRICs is a fascinating period for those concerned with how the future of international order will play out because each rising power has an ambiguous relationship to the existing order as well as different concepts and values underpinning its narrative of future order. Given that previous power transitions have often led to systemic violence, it remains to be seen whether any existing or rising powers can craft a strategic narrative that other powers can align with their own.

ESRC PhD Funding in Politics at Royal Holloway

As part of the ESRC Doctoral Training Centre (DTC) we are pleased to welcome scholarship applications from well-qualified applicants. The ESRC DTC is in partnership with the universities of Kent, Reading and Surrey. Further details of the ESRC DTC South East can be found here. The ESRC DTC has a total of 24 fully funded PhD scholarships available.

The deadline for applications for ESRC funding is 4pm Friday February 22nd 2013. In order to apply for ESRC funding you must be eligible for an award and be accepted on to the PhD programme in the Department of Politics and International Relations. The New Political Communication Unit is a research centre of the Department.

Full details on ESRC PhD funding can be found here.

Applications and Admissions

Applications from students who wish to be considered for ESRC funding should be made directly to the Department of Politics and International Relations. The Department welcomes applications from highly qualified and motivated candidates. The application process for our postgraduate research programmes is an interactive one. We place great emphasis on matching prospective students to supervisors’ interests, building on our existing research activities. We are particularly keen to encourage applications in areas related to our four research units - Centre for European Politics; the New Political Communication Unit; the Centre for Global and Transnational Studies and the Political Theory Reading Group.

Interested potential applicants should first refer to our website to obtain a good idea of the department's research foci: click here. The Department is only able to consider applications in research areas of interest to its full-time academic staff. The research agenda of the New Political Communication Unit can be found by browsing its website here.

In the first instance, potential applicants should prepare a research proposal, outlining the project that they will undertake if accepted onto the PhD programme.  This should be at least 8-10 pages long and should include the key research questions, proposed methods and a bibliography. Email this research proposal, along with a cv, to the Director of Graduate Study, Dr Alister Miskimmon (until 14/12/12) or Dr Evelyn Goh who will take over as Director of Graduate Study on 1st January 2013.

If the proposal is met with interest by a potential supervisor, the Director of Graduate Study will invite the potential applicant to discuss their proposal further via email. UK-based applicants may be invited to visit the Department. Promising potential applicants will then be advised to apply formally for a place on our PhD programme. Candidates shortlisted for the PhD programme will be interviewed.

Potential applicants may contact the Director of Graduate Study with proposals at any stage of the academic year. We will also have a range of Royal Holloway scholarships which will be awarded on a competitive basis to well-qualified candidates.

New NPCU book on public diplomacy in Spanish

We are delighed to announce that María Luisa Azpíroz has published her PhD research as a new book, Diplomacia pública: El caso de la 'guerra contra el terror', with Editorial UOC.

MªLuisa was a visiting PhD researcher at the New Political Communication Unit supervised by Ben O'Loughlin, and based at Facultad de Comunicación, University of Navarra, Spain. Her supervisor there was Professor María Teresa La Porte Fernández-Alfaro. 

We wish MªLuisa the best of luck with her future career. 

Six days til the deadline: Call for Papers - MWC 5th anniversary conference

Call for papers

Media, War & Conflict Fifth Anniversary Conference

11-12 April 2013

Royal Holloway, University of London

250 word abstracts to Lisa.Dacunha@rhul.ac.uk by 10 October 2012

Media, War & Conflict’s fifth anniversary conference will be held on 11-12 April 2013 at Royal Holloway, University of London. The conference is open to scholars, journalists, military practitioners and activists from around the world.

Keynote speakers:

• Jamie Shea, NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges
• Barbie Zelizer, Raymond Williams Professor of Communication, University of Pennsylvania
• Cees Hamelink, Emeritus Professor of International Communication at the University of Amsterdam and Emeritus Professor for Media, Religion and Culture at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam.

The journal was first published in April 2008, bringing together international scholars and journalists from the fields of political science, history, and communication, and military, NGO and journalist practitioners. The aim was to map the shifting arena of war, conflict and terrorism in an increasingly mediated age, and to explore cultural, political and technological transformations in media-military relations, journalistic practices and digital media, and their impact on policy, publics, and outcomes of warfare. The fifth anniversary conference offers the chance to showcase the best research in this field while also taking stock of how the field has developed and identifying the emerging challenges we face.

We invite papers on a range of topics, including:

• Contemporary and historical war reporting
• Changing forms of credibility, legitimacy and authority
• Media ethics in the coverage of conflict
• The role of citizen-users and social media in conflict
• Terrorism, media and publics
• Intelligence operations and media
• Digital and cyber warfare
• Media and conflict prevention, peacekeeping and post-conflict scenarios
• Photo and video journalism in wartime
• War and conflict in popular culture
• The power of the visual and other modalities
• Commemoration and memorialisation of war and conflict

The deadline for abstracts is 10 October 2012. Please submit 250-word abstracts and author-affiliation details to Lisa.Dacunha@rhul.ac.uk.

Billur Aslan to present at EU-Middle East Forum, Cairo

Tahrir Square, 22 November 2011Billur Aslan will present a paper at the DGAP 17th New Faces Conference on "Pluralism in Egypt and Tunisia – How the Political Opening is Changing Islamist Forces" on 4–7 October 2012 in Cairo. Billur's talk is entitled, 'Connective Power of Islamist Parties: How does the Internet shape the activities of Islamists in Egypt?' 

The conference is organised by the German Council on Foreign Relations and the American University in Cairo. Speakers include Khaled Hamza, Chief Editor of the Muslim Brotherhood’s main website, ikhwanweb.com, and Gudrun Krämer, Director of the Institute of Islamic Studies and Director of the Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies at Freie Universität Berlin.

NPCU at ISA 2013: A growing force

On their way to the ISQ wine reception.We are delighted that a number of NPCU researchers will be presenting at the International Studies Association (ISA) Annual Convention in San Francisco in April 2013. 

Billur Aslan will present papers entitled, The Diffusion of Revolutionary Movements via the Internet: Post Election Protests in Russia and The Power of The Internet in the Rising Protests: The Case of the Iranian Green Movement. James Dennis's paper is entitled, Diffusion of Information on Social-Networking Sites within a Participatory Continuum: A Critique of the Utopian / Dystopian Divide 2.0 and Slacktivism. Meanwhile, following our successful Olympics and the -isms conference this summer, Mark Pope will talk about The Olympic Games, cosmopolitanism, and UK news media discourse on human rights issues: consequences for public diplomacy. Finally, Ben O'Loughlin will present a paper, A non-representational history of diplomacy and communication.

(ISA login may be required to access abstracts).

New Article by Andrew Chadwick: “Recent Shifts in the Relationship Between the Internet and Democratic Engagement in Britain and the United States: Granularity, Informational Exuberance, and Political Learning”

I have a new article out in an excellent edited collection that has been put together by Eva Anduiza, Mike Jensen, and Laia Jorba, and published in Lance Bennett and Robert Entman’s book series with Cambridge University Press.

Mike Jensen has written a useful blog post describing the book here.

The volume has its origins in a superb workshop held in Barcelona.

The title of my chapter is: “Recent Shifts in the Relationship Between the Internet and Democratic Engagement in Britain and the United States: Granularity, Informational Exuberance, and Political Learning.” I hope you find it interesting.

Here are some Amazon links:

Amazon US link.

Amazon UK link.

There’s also a Kindle and a Nook edition.

Media, War & Conflict 5th Anniversary Conference - Call for Papers

Call for papers

Media, War & Conflict Fifth Anniversary Conference

11-12 April 2013

Royal Holloway, University of London

250 word abstracts to Lisa.Dacunha@rhul.ac.uk by 10 October 2012

Media, War & Conflict’s fifth anniversary conference will be held on 11-12 April 2013 at Royal Holloway, University of London. The conference is open to scholars, journalists, military practitioners and activists from around the world.

Keynote speakers:

• Jamie Shea, NATO Deputy Assistant Secretary General for Emerging Security Challenges
• Barbie Zelizer, Raymond Williams Professor of Communication, University of Pennsylvania
• Cees Hamelink, Emeritus Professor of International Communication at the University of Amsterdam and Emeritus Professor for Media, Religion and Culture at the Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam.

The journal was first published in April 2008, bringing together international scholars and journalists from the fields of political science, history, and communication, and military, NGO and journalist practitioners. The aim was to map the shifting arena of war, conflict and terrorism in an increasingly mediated age, and to explore cultural, political and technological transformations in media-military relations, journalistic practices and digital media, and their impact on policy, publics, and outcomes of warfare. The fifth anniversary conference offers the chance to showcase the best research in this field while also taking stock of how the field has developed and identifying the emerging challenges we face.

We invite papers on a range of topics, including:

• Contemporary and historical war reporting
• Changing forms of credibility, legitimacy and authority
• Media ethics in the coverage of conflict
• The role of citizen-users and social media in conflict
• Terrorism, media and publics
• Intelligence operations and media
• Digital and cyber warfare
• Media and conflict prevention, peacekeeping and post-conflict scenarios
• Photo and video journalism in wartime
• War and conflict in popular culture
• The power of the visual and other modalities
• Commemoration and memorialisation of war and conflict

The deadline for abstracts is 10 October 2012. Please submit 250-word abstracts and author-affiliation details to Lisa.Dacunha@rhul.ac.uk.

New project: The Olympics, Twitter and the BBC

Did the BBC's body match feature create more global engagement than its live coverage?The 2012 Olympics were a chance for the BBC to ‘bring the world to London and London to the world’.  Part of the BBC’s remit is to promote a ‘global conversation’ by widening user participation, creating dialogue that overcomes national, religious and ethnic divisions, and even cultivates a sense of global citizenship. To assess whether it achieved these goals, the NPCU is working with the BBC and the ESRC’s Centre for Research on Socio Cultural Change (CRESC) to analyse how Arabic, Russian, Persian and English-speaking audiences responded to the Olympics and the BBC’s coverage of it. The multilingual research team is starting from Big Datasets of Tweets to narrow down to key events around which issues of nationalism and religion came into play. There was no shortage of such events that got people talking, for instance female athletes in Islamic dress, accusations of doping against Chinese swimmer Ye Shiwen, and the embrace of US wrestler Jordan Burroughs and his Iranian counterpart Sadegh Goudarzi. The Opening and Closing Ceremonies meanwhile offered numerous opportunities for global audiences to think about London and Britain; whether this was with affection, contempt or sheer post-colonial ambivalence remains to be seen. 

The project also marks an important point in thinking about measuring the performance of global media. The BBC must prove the ‘value’ of its services to many masters, from the licence-paying individual with their particular tastes and the non-license-paying overseas user comparing the BBC to their national media to the Foreign & Commonwealth Office official who may see the BBC as part of UK public diplomacy to sway audiences around the world. At the same time, the advent of Big Data means there appear to be new ways to measure the BBC’s ‘effects’ and ‘influence’ but how robust these are is debatable. And finally, is a valuable ‘global conversation’ one where political learning takes place, where prejudices are worn away over time, or is connection itself an intrinsic good? The project allows us to address classic political questions about the nature of public spheres, communication and deliberation, as well as the commercial imperatives of reach, relationships and branding.

The project is led by Marie Gillespie of The Open University, Rob Procter of Manchester University, and Ben O’Loughlin at Royal Holloway. The NPCU PhD students Billur Aslan and James Dennis are part of the multilingual research team. We are grateful to Jemma Ahmed and Emily Mould at BBC Worldwide for their cooperation and insights. Findings will be published in due course.

Semantic Polling launch event, Millbank House, 5 July

Sir Robert WorcesterThe LSE's Media Policy Project and the Hansard Society will host a launch event on 5 July for Nick Anstead and Ben O'Loughlin's policy brief, 'Semantic Polling: The Ethics of Online Public Opinion'. Nick and Ben will introduce the arguments of their briefing, before Sir Robert Worcester (right), Chairman and Founder of public opinion firm MORI, will respond.

The paper outlines how social media firms are using a mix of automated new techniques and more traditional social science methods to understand public opinion in real-time. Anstead and O'Loughlin argue that what is significant about these new techniques is not their capacity to predict the result of any election. Instead, semantic polling lets us understand how public opinion forms and shifts. Paradoxically, statistical processing of Big Data provides us with greater qualitative understanding of public opinion.

However, semantic polling exists in a regulatory black hole. As a new phenomenon that cross-cuts marketing, media and political spheres, it is unclear which agency is responsible for regulating it. Journalists have failed to report on it accurately, and the public seem unaware their views are being permanently monitored. Semantic polling thus creates a number of ethical questions, which the audience will have a chance to debate.

Some places are still available. If you wish to attend please contact Ben.OLoughlin@rhul.ac.uk

Time: 14:00 - 16:00

Date: 5 July 2012

Place: Archbishops' Room, Millbank House, 1 Millbank, Westminster, London SW1P 3JU. 1 Millbank is on the corner of Millbank and Great College Street. Map here.

Thanks to Nate Vaagen for help organising the event.