Eastcast

In this episode, we explore the dynamics of digital propaganda during the Russia-Ukraine war. Agnese Fossa and Luca Morniroli talk with Gregory Asmolov, a communication scholar at King's College London. Gregory's research focuses, among other things, on participatory warfare, propaganda, and disinformation. We examine the development of Russia's digital propaganda strategies and discuss the concept of participatory propaganda, along with insights on how to counteract it.

Vadim Basin and Jasper Hendrickx explore the topic of digital resistance with a feminist anti-war activist from Russia. Since the war in Ukraine escalated in February 2022, the Feminist Anti-War Resistance emerged in Russia from several feminist groups that existed earlier. How can anti-war activists speak up and create resistance in a politically restrictive environment? How do they convince other women in Russia to join them in this movement? In this episode, our guest, who preferred to stay anonymous, talks about how she and her fellow activists tackle these obstacles to make a difference.

How has fact-checking evolved in the wake of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine? How can we evaluate the effectiveness of fact-checking organizations? How can we effectively differentiate between truth and misinformation?

In this episode, we talk to Ilya Ber, founder of Provereno Media, a Russian independent non-profit dedicated to fact-checking. Ilya shares his insights on the challenges faced by journalists in this field and describes his experience working in exile as an independent Russian fact-checker.

In this episode, we discuss the complexities of the modern warfare, with a focus on the use of mobile phones and recording devices on the frontlines of the ongoing Russia's war in Ukraine. How have mobile media reshaped warfare and communication strategies during armed conflicts? We discuss this and other questions around communication on the frontlines with Dr. Roman Horbyk, media scholar and expert in history and media culture of Eastern Europe at Södertörn University in Stockholm.

How is it to be a war-influencer? What responsibilities and challenges do they face? In this episode, we talk with Valeria Shashenock, a Ukrainian influencer who fled her hometown Chernihiv because of the full-scale invasion. Valeriia gives us insights into her daily life and her story of becoming one of the most-followed Ukrainian influencers on Tiktok and Instagram, at the same time navigating her life between a public persona and a young woman, worried for her homeland and family while the Russian invasion of Ukraine is still at full-scale capacity.

What are the primary weapons in today's cyberwar? How has the cyberconflict between Russia and Ukraine evolved since Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022? How do cyber-attacks impact citizens, and what can ordinary users do to protect themselves? In this episode, we discuss these questions with Helene Pleil, a research associate at the Digital Society Institute at ESMT Berlin. Helen specializes in cybersecurity and cyber policy, approaching these topics from a peace and conflict studies perspective.

Mariia Dumanska and Catalina Hernández talk with Olga Rudenko, editor-in-chief of The Kyiv Independent. In little over a year of being founded, this Ukrainian English-language online newspaper has become one of the main sources of information about Ukraine for the world, playing a crucial role in reporting on the war since the Russian full-scale invasion in February 2022. How did she and her team get there, how does she assess the development of Ukrainian journalism in the recent years, and how do journalists cope with challenges of covering the ongoing war in their country?

How do Russian independent media operate after the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion in Ukraine? Should journalism try to remain neutral in the face of the war? Alexander Polivanov, a chief editor of Helpdesk Media, talks about the challenges Russian independent media has been faced since February 24 2022 - and the solutions Helpdesk Media has developed for working in exile.

In this episode, Alicja Ptak of Notes from Poland and Reuters talks about her experience as a journalist at different news agencies in times of crisis. 2022 saw not only the continued crisis surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, but also Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and the various consequences it carried. In this context we talk about the limits and liberties of small and large media, mental health in crisis journalism, and journalists’ role in activism.

Sophie and Luisa talk with Peter Bajomi-Lazaar, professor of Mass Communication at the Budapest Business School University of Applied Sciences, on current challenges and developments of the Hungarian media system. The talk focusses on the societal polarization and divides within the media system, Orbán’s media policy, as well as on the influence of the Russia's war in Ukraine on the Hungarian media discourse. 

In this episode, we talk with data scientist Ksenia Iliuk about Russia’s disinformation campaigns during the war in Ukraine, as well as about ways to combat digital propaganda on national and individual level. Ksenia Iliuk works for the NGO LetsData and specializes in leveraging the power of artificial
intelligence to identify and expose hostile information influence, in particular on social media. In cooperation with the Ukrainian NGO DetectorMedia, they analyze online media discourse around Ukraine and provide data-empowered insights.

How can Belarusians access independent media under the rule of the Lukashenka's regime and how can they differentiate between real and fake information? How do Belarusians feel about the war in Ukraine and how do they organise resistance? How can Western countries support Belarus and are they doing enough?

Zmicier Mickiewicz, journalist at Belsat TV and research fellow at Belarus Security Blog, specialises in information warfare, propaganda, and international relations. In this episode, he talks about the challenges Belarusians are currently facing in times of war and uncertainty.

How important are different types of media for political communication in Poland? Is the word "propaganda" approriate to describe the content of pro-goverment public media in the country? In this  episode, Wiktoria Kocent and Konrad Kuleta talk to Prof. Dr. Michał Głowacki, media scientist from the University of Warsaw, about different aspects of political communication in today's Poland.

Prof. Dr. Michał Głowacki is editor-in-chief of the Central European Journal of Communication and a board member of the Polish Society for Social Communication. His academic work focusses on media policy, public media, media accountability and the culture of innovation. 

In 2020, major protests erupted in Belarus after the presidential election. However, they were violently supressed by the government and since then the authoritarian regime in the country has become even more restrictive. Social media played a crucial role in these protests. How exactly did they help organize the protest despite of the Internet shutdown in the country? Do social media still have a democratizing effect on the society? What is the situation in Belarus now, in the beginning of 2022, and what are the perspectives for the digital activism country?

Dr. Aliaksandr Herasimenka from the Oxford Internet Institute talks among other things about the role Telegram played for protesters and about the power of social media that can challenge authoritarian regimes. The episode is hosted by Michelle Laschinski, Lucia Cecilia Magro and Antonia Vollbrecht.

The media landscape in the Czech Republic has undergone a major shift in the last decade and the changes are still ongoing. A new government after the election in 2021, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic are some of many factors to take into consideration when talking about today’s Czech media.

In this episode, Ruolin Wu and Truls Hovelstuen talk to Dr. Jan Motal, associate professor at the Department of Media Studies and Journalism, Masaryk University, about the latest developments on the media landscape of the Czech Republic.

Is there a spark of hope for Hungary’s media freedom on the horizon? In this episode, Lisa Barsig and Christina Bayer talk to Dr. Claudia-Yvette Matthes about the current state of media system and political communication in the country as well as about a possible window of opportunity for freedom of speech in the wake of the parliamentary elections in April 2022.

Dr. Claudia-Yvette Matthes is Director of International MA Programmes at the Chair of Comparative Democracy and Political Systems of Eastern Europe, Humboldt University of Berlin.

How do social media affect journalism in Albania? Are the consequences of the country’s communist past still tangible today? Do journalists experience (self)-censorship and how do they deal with it? Angelo Haruni, TV journalist and reporter for the Albanian news network A2CNN, talks with Kyara Durlinger and Jill Schoeters about Albanian media landscape and its perspectives in comparison with the other Balkan countries.