Dear all, Lisa Garbe and I would like to draw your attention to a call for abstracts or full panels for a section on “Digital Authoritarianism” at the ECPR General Conference this year in Prague (Sept. 4-8). Here you find more information about the section: https://ecpr.eu/Events/Event/SectionDetails/1303 Section outline: During the last two decades, authoritarianism has gone virtual. Not only people living under authoritarian rule but also those living in democracies are faced with new challenges and urgencies in light of the emerging phenomenon of digital authoritarianism. Authoritarian regimes have started to draw on a plethora of digital tools and sophisticated computational strategies to manipulate opinions and manufacture consent among the population of their countries and beyond. Examples include repressive cyber legislations, widespread censorship, intrusive methods of online surveillance, and industrialized forms of digital disinformation such as troll factories and aggressive cyber troops. However, while several new studies look into single tools of digital authoritarianism, there is a lack of comparative research which investigates the varieties of digital authoritarian strategies (Keremoğlu & Weidmann, 2020). Hence, we know little about how the different practices of digital authoritarianism complement each other, how they are combined with offline authoritarian practices and what purposes they are intended to serve. In addition, we know little about the effects and scope of such digital power. Based on these gaps in our knowledge, this Section invites papers and (additional) panel submissions that shed light on the following themes and questions: * Panel 1: Strategies of digital authoritarianism * Panel 2: Digital authoritarianism and regime change * Panel 3: Digital manipulation of individuals’ behaviour and perceptions in autocracies * Panel 4: Transnational forms of digital authoritarianism Based on these (and additional) panel proposals, this Section aims to feature contributions which address a wide range of different theoretical perspectives and empirical studies. We invite methodologically diverse proposals which look into single cases of digital authoritarianism or which study authoritarian internet strategies from a comparative perspective. Please submit abstracts or full panel proposals latest by February 28 (midnight UK time). Best wishes, Lisa and Seraphine Dr. Seraphine F. Maerz Research Fellow Principal Investigator “Smart Authoritarianism” (funded by the DFG) Institute of Political Science Goethe University Frankfurt/Main Website<https://sites.google.com/view/seraphinemaerz/about> | Mastodon<%20https:/mastodon.social/@seraphine> | Git<https://github.com/SeraphineM> | Twitter<https://twitter.com/SeraphineMaerz>