Role of Communication Technologies in the Processes of Socio-Political Destabilization of North African Countries

Journal of Asian and African Studies. 2025. P. 00219096251313537–00219096251313537.

Shishkina A.

This article aims to analyse the role played by the latest information and communication technologies in the processes of socio-political destabilization in North African countries. First of all, we are talking about the events of the Arab Spring, during which the trend of the influence of the Internet on mass movements perhaps reached its apogee. Communicative factors such as, for example, the number of Internet users in each of the countries under consideration, including the number of mobile and fixed connections, the number of social network users, the impact of censorship in the media space, the role of satellite channels, as well as the presence of a high number of mosques in large cities are considered as spaces capable of accumulating large numbers of people. Qualitative comparative analysis is chosen as a tool for analysing the data. The author concludes that only some aspects of the spread of the newest media have a noticeable impact on the dynamics of revolutionary activity. Thus, the widespread use of the Internet did not affect the escalation of protest activity, while the ability to connect to social networks played an important role.

Keywords: communication technologies, Internet, North Africa, socio-political destabilization, new media