In the context of widely spread online disinformation, manipulation, and hate speech in the digital world, Democracy Reporting International (DRI) is implementing a new project to monitor social media in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.
DRI has been increasingly active in social media monitoring (SMM) since 2017, strengthening local capacities to monitor social media during elections, sharing information and evidence gathered in different countries, bringing together expert’202forganisations, producing methodologies, ‘202fand informing the public and expert debate.’202f
Within the framework of the project “Words Matter”, DRI and its partners seek to contribute to strengthening the safeguarding of democratic processes and societies’ resilience to online disinformation and hate speech in the MENA region.
DRI’202fworks with partner organisations from’202ffour MENA’202fcountries (Tunisia, Sudan, ‘202fLebanon and Jordan), strengthening local capacities to monitor and’202fanalyse online’202fdisinformation and hate speech during key national democratic processes while building a regional network to allow for comparative analysis and peer learning.
Our partners in the regional project include:
- L’Institut de Presse et des Sciences de l’Information (IPSI), from Tunisia;
- Mourakiboun, from Tunisia;
- Sudanese Development Initiative (SUDIA), from Sudan;
- Maharat Foundation, from Lebanon;
- Al-Hayat Center for Civil Society Development;
- Jordan Open-Source Association (JOSA), from Jordan.
“Words Matter aims to achieve the following objectives:
- Capacity-building for project partners to acquire institutional skills to design sound social media monitoring methodologies, monitor disinformation and hate speech online effectively, and enhance evidence of the impacts of disinformation and hate speech online on civic or political participation and human rights.’202f’202f’202f
- enhanced multi-stakeholder and regional engagement to advocate against and combat online disinformation and hate speech, through a civil society network, as well as through continuous exchanges on transparent regulations.; and’202f’202f
- in the countries of project partners, improved awareness and resilience of civic target groups, and concrete action by decision-makers to combat online hate speech and disinformation transparently.’202f’202f’202f
How we do it
Through the project “Words Matter”, DRI cooperates with civil society organisations to closely monitor online discourse and streams on relevant social media platforms according to the local context. Together with partner organisations, the project uses the data-driven findings to support the partners in promoting clearer and more transparent regulations.
The project’s approach stands on local ownership and sustainability principles. The project works with local partner organisations that lead in the social media monitoring (SMM) after receiving capacity-building support and training that enables them to conduct data-driven social media analyses of key national democratic processes and political participation.
The project’s team supports CSO partners in their advocacy work, including relevant actors from social media and tech companies. The project also focuses on exchange among partners to share lessons learned and methodologies and collaborate on collective advocacy. Additionally, the project acknowledges that tackling disinformation and hate speech requires a joint effort of different stakeholders (civil society, government, social media and tech companies etc.). Therefore, dialogue among all relevant actors is continuously ongoing to discuss critical challenges and identify recommendations for pro-democratic online regulatory reforms.
Our team
- Hervé de Baillenx, Project Director
- Emna Mouelhi, Project coordinator
- Amira Kridagh, MEL & Project coordinator
- Mohamed Abderahim Ben Salem, Finance Coordinator
- Mejda Souissi, Project Officer
- Wafaa Heikal, Social Media Analyst
- Makram Dhifalli, Data Analyst
News
- Monitoring social media in Arabic with our Digital Democracy Monitor – May 2022
- Regional Exchange in Amman – Social media monitoring community takes off – April 2022
- Tackling disinformation and hate speech in the MENA region – August 2021
Publications
Online Political Discourse in MENA: 2022 Lebanese and Jordanian Elections as a Case Study
This report is the result of the contributions of DRI’s partners in Tunisia, Jordan, Lebanon, and Sudan. They provided data-driven content related to their specific contexts from December 2021 to April 2022. It is the first report to be published as part of “Words Matter” and will be followed by three other reports.
The report investigates online disinformation and hate speech trends during key national democratic processes to shed light on the behaviours, patterns and streams observed during these processes. It also develops national and regional recommendations for CSOs, researchers and social media platforms to promote transparent regulations to combat online disinformation and hate speech. At the regional level, to enhance information integrity, so citizens can form their own opinions and vote without being exposed to manipulation campaigns, as well as to prevent hate speech from being translated into violence, the report recommends:
- Agreeing on a definition of hate speech that does not curb the freedom of expression online, one of the main challenges for our partners during their social media monitoring proved to be agreeing on one definition of hate speech that considers their local contexts while respecting international standards.
- Building regional networks and coalitions to facilitate the exchange of knowledge, including the main behaviours related to disinformation and hate speech in the countries of the partner organisations.
- Gathering data and encouraging open data practices while respecting personal data protection standards. This is to be done by working with social media platforms so that they provide greater access to social media monitoring tools to CSOs and researchers in the MENA region and work with the platforms on identifying hate speech and disinformation trends in the region while ensuring high standards from regional actors to protect personal data; and
- Building better coordination mechanisms with social media platforms on content removal, where, according to our partners’ experience, detecting harmful content becomes very challenging when social media platforms remove content without providing a clear explanation for the reasons for removal.