[Cross-posted from Complex Terrain Lab]
On 21 May, Daniel Kimmage, Regional Analyst for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, spoke to the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence at King’s College London. The basis for the talk was his recently published study The Al-Qaeda Media Nexus: The Virtual Network Behind the Global Message [.pdf] which received a fair amount of attention in the blogosphere and beyond. He is also author, with Kathleen Ridolfo, of The War of Images and Ideas: How Sunni Insurgents in Iraq and Their Supporters Worldwide are Using The Media [.pdf].
Kimmage is worth listening to and reading for many reasons, but the principal advantage Kimmage has over most commentators and analysts on the subject is that he is fluent in Arabic. This provides him with real insight into the practical workings of jihadist media, whilst most of us observe from at least one linguistic remove. His sample in this case was 446 outlets identified in July 2007, of which 78% concentrated on Iraq, in particular the Islamic State of Iraq and Ansar al-Sunnah.
In Kimmage’s analysis, jihadist media have developed media products with consistent and systematic branding, using virtual media production and distribution entities (MPDEs) to link a plethora of groups under the global jihadist umbrella. This strategy, mirroring conventional media structures, imparts a degree of legitimacy and credibility to jihadist narratives, as well as facilitating control over the ideological content of the ‘message’.
It is this desire to control media output that Kimmage identifies as the principal reason why jihadist groups are not at the cutting-edge of technology use, in contrast to much of the reporting and analysis to the contrary. The use of ‘web 2.0′ technologies, such as social networks and video sharing sites, threatens message control and is therefore actively discouraged by jihadist groups. As previously noted, this is a fairly traditional approach to media, one that eschews the reflexivity and interactivity of available technology in favour of one-way message propagation. Essentially, it is a propaganda machine.
Kimmage concluded by examining the origin of foreign fighters in Iraq, the majority of which come from media-repressive regimes such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Libya. He posed this speculative question as a result: could a freer, more interactive internet be the secret weapon against al-Qaeda’s ideology? We are reaching a point where virtual claims and kinetic actions are increasingly divergent - advertisement of this trend could reduce internet radicalisation and help stem the flow of online jihadist rhetoric.
My gut feeling is that this would be a sensible move. The challenge of convincing repressive regimes to open up the virtual media space is a difficult one, and there is also no guarantee that a bottom-up, ‘liberalising’ debate would emerge in those societies in which jihadist media flourishes. Jihadist forums are not exactly welcoming of ideological challenges to their chosen stances, and increased access to the internet and the lifting of censorship is unlikely to be met with analagous social reform either. I am reminded of a notice pinned to the wall of a downtown Cairo internet cafe I occasionally visited: “Our patrons are kindly asked not to mention any of these subjects whilst using the internet: sex, religion, politics.”
Kimmage’s study is an interesting one, with undoubted value but, and he freely admits this, is of limited scope. Jihadist internet use is by no means restricted to the Arabic language, and his sample was kept deliberately manageable in size and time. His assertion that the sophistication of jihadists’ use of internet technology is often overstated has some traction, but equally ignores the fact that those wishing to employ counterstrategies have barely even got to grips with the internet as a contestable space. This is changing, particularly in the U.S. military, but there is a long way to go, conceptually and operationally.
I also find myself thinking that there is an opposite underestimation at work here. The nature of the internet is such that - and I believe a lot of insurgents and terrorists know this - once material is on the internet, it tends to take unpredictable paths. This in itself constitutes the exercise of a strategic choice that this study and others miss: a lot of material is deliberately and wilfully produced just so it can be remixed and reworked by whoever chooses to - this is categorically not an attempt to straitjacket the ‘message’ within a normative media framework. The propaganda of the deed thrives in this viral, memetic environment, which might even be a force-multiplier in the global insurgency.
I wish Daniel luck in finding new employment after the recent restructuring of RFE/RL, and look forward to further work in this field. I suspect a new study might back up many of his findings but also, in the ever-changing and dynamic global information ecology, open up unexpected avenues of research into insurgent media.
