Social Media as a Threat to National Security

Mgr. Evgeniya Fomenko

Master's thesis

Abstract:

In the Russian case the media coverage at the same time contributed to the protest movement and damaged it, because with the main focus on the Internet statements the opposition could not come up with an adequate program for real life. Many of the protests did not go further social networks: people were extremely proactive in expressing their opinion in the Internet, but at the end they did not do the same in the real life. Therefore, on the example of the Russian events the ambiguity of the role of social media was shown, and this ambiguity was connected not only to the possible damages of national security, but also to the most likely damage for the protest movement itself.

Keywords

social media, protests, Russia, discourse analysis

Language used: English

Date on which the thesis was submitted / produced: 12. 5. 2014

Thesis defence

• Date of defence: 10. 6. 2014
• Supervisor: doc. Bernadette Nadya Jaworsky, Ph.D.
• Reader: Dr. Werner Binder

Masaryk University

Faculty of Social Studies

Master programme / field:
Sociology / Sociology (Eng.)