One of the objectives set out as part of the Netwar in Cyberia Research Project is to produce a strategic-level assessment of the information environment in which extremist groups operate. This will allow an analysis of collective and emergent behaviors within complex information systems and the identification of factors which could influence the success of Public Diplomacy responses to Jihadist online content.

The embassy, at least in its traditional form, is facing an existential crisis. The global transformations of the twenty-first century have dramatically changed the way nations practice diplomacy. The rise of digital communications, diminishing resources, and growing security threats all raise the question of whether the traditional embassy is still relevant.

Measuring the impact of digital diplomacy using quantitative metrics (number of followers, retweets, shares, likes...) has become a general practice among Ministries of Foreign Affairs (MFAs) […] the MFAs’ digital communication campaigns are presumed not to merely “preach to the choir” of sympathetic followers, but to actually reach constituencies outside the self-reinforcing “bubble” of like-minded followers.

There are 38 female heads of state and government, foreign ministers and leaders of international organizations who have a personal Twitter account. The Twiplomacy ‘Women Leaders’ Twitter list includes among others Queen Rania of Jordan, Brazilian President Dilma Rouseff, Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg, and Vice President of the EU Commission Federica Mogherini.

Abeera Akhtar and her colleagues at Pakistan’s Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) in Pakistan launched the “FATE — From Apathy to Empathy” project against extremism. The LUMS group was one of 45 student teams from around the world that applied to this semester’s P2P (Peer to Peer): Challenging Extremism initiative.