Nationalism is widespread on the Internet and it’s getting worse. The transmutation to digital media is making people a lot less tolerant. We need to tamp down the rhetoric

In Renaissance Europe, the Gutenberg printing Press is noted for its pivotal role in challenging the religious and political authority of the Catholic church that eventually culminated in the Protestant Reformation.  But before the emergence of religious and political revolutions that would primarily shape political establishments in the West, the printing Press was initially perceived by the church establishment as a way to strengthen its dominance. This shows the one-way nature of Print media: Produced by a few, for the many to consume. The result was a breakdown of classical and medieval forms of authority and the emergence of new sources of political identity. Is it fair to say that the Internet, as a form of media, has had its share of comparable effects on the political establishments in contemporary times?

The advancement of neoteric media technologies and discussion fora has added a new dimension to the conventional practices of political contention. Transformed from a remote source of information into a vibrant and interactive political public sphere in its own right, the Internet connects the societal actors, mobilises pressure and frames public opinion. Whereas the Print media allowed for the spread of ideas from the few to the many, Internet media connects at once the many to many. Like the Print media, it acts as a tool of emotionally-driven connectivity through which political communities are (re)imagined. Its two-way character makes for a more dialectical process between producers and consumers of media. This is a promise to enhance a public sphere of debate that is conducive to democracy. The Internet and in particular social media, however, lack the regulatory nature of a news daily. It is this very characteristic feature of social media that makes possible two contradictory forces: First, greater impetus for individuals to express opinions and foster discussions and deliberations; second, the (re)solidifying of communities based on exclusivist, narrow conceptions of identity. In this information age, masses are simultaneously consumers and products of social media. As a result, the dialectical process works both ways in terms of media (Internet), empowering the masses with new ideas, or segregating them through misleading information. 

The overriding question is: How to handle this enormous volume of information and individuals’ ability to interact directly with one another with unprecedented speed that in ways leads us to broader connections, rather than mistrust.  Mistrust seems to come in two major forms: First, based on xenophobia and increased animosity towards those deemed foreign or outside one’s community and second, towards remaining sources of fact-checked and institutionalised media. The result is an unprecedented set of tools through which leaders can divide and control populations by disseminating confusion by (mis)information overload (a strategy known during Soviet times as kompromat). This becomes all the more complex given the role average individuals can unknowingly play in fomenting hateful sentiments against other groups or communities. Most of us thought as well as believed the digital technology would connect the whole world in new ways. The Internet was supposed to break down those last boundaries between what are essentially ‘synthetic nation states’ and herald a new era of globalisation. But the Internet age has actually heralded the opposite ramification. We are not advancing toward a new global society, but instead retreating back to nationalism.

The transmutation to a digital media environment is making people a whole lot less tolerant of this dissolution of boundaries. For example, scapegoating of a foreign or non-white ‘Other’ was key to both the breakdown of European Cohesion and the election of Donald Trump.  Then there are India’s ‘cyber-nationalists’ who expound on the violence and mayhem they wish to bring upon those who don’t share their vision of national identity. Through the social media, they are effectively muddying the debate on the nature and character of nationalism in India.  This all seems to vindicate what Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore had once envisioned.  We are perplexed by today’s nationalist, regressively anti-global sentiments. Likewise, major nations of the world are in a cyber-war arms race. We’re all being hurt by collateral damage. Governments across the globe have discovered the Internet and everyone is spying on everyone else. At the same time, many nations are demanding more control over the cyberspace within their borders. They reserve the right to censor and spy, and to limit the ability of others to do the same. The prevailing espionage mechanism will result in more cyberweapons for attack and more cyber surveillance for defence. Thereby, this will result in less free-market innovation and more Government control over the protocols of the Internet. We are actually intervening an information-age Cold War that could escalate into a full-fledged cyber-war. Globalism has had some genuinely deleterious effects on many of those who are now pushing back. Nationalism is widespread on the Internet, and it’s getting worse. We need to tamp down the rhetoric.

(The writer is a Student Fellow (elected) of Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland)