Digital Fascism - Media, Communication and Society Volume Four

This fourth volume in Christian Fuchs's Media, Communication and Society book series outlines the theoretical foundations of digital fascism and presents case studies of how fascism is communicated online.
Digital Fascism presents and engages with theoretical approaches and empirical studies that allow us to understand how fascism, right-wing authoritarianism, xenophobia, and nationalism are communicated on the Internet. The book builds on theoretical foundations from key theorists such as Theodor W. Adorno, Franz L. Neumann, Erich Fromm, Herbert Marcuse, Wilhelm Reich, Leo Löwenthal, Moishe Postone, Günther Anders, M. N. Roy, and Henry Giroux. The book draws on a range of case studies, including Nazi-celebrations of Hitler's birthday on Twitter, the 'red scare 2.0' directed against Jeremy Corbyn, and political communication online (Donald Trump, Boris Johnson, the Austrian presidential election). These case studies analyse right-wing communication online and on social media. Fuchs argues for the safeguarding of the democratic public sphere and that slowing down and decommodifying the logic of the media can advance and renew debate culture in the age of digital authoritarianism, fake news, echo chambers, and filter bubbles.
Each chapter focuses on a particular dimension of digital fascism or a critical theorist whose work helps us to illuminate how fascism and digital fascism work, making this book an essential reading for both undergraduate and postgraduate students of media and communication studies, sociology, politics, and political economy as well as anyone who wants to understand what digital fascism is and how it works.

List of contents

1 Introduction  PART I: FOUNDATIONS  2 The Relevance of Franz L. Neumann's Critical Theory Today: Behemoth and Anxiety and Politics in the New Age of Authoritarian Capitalism  3 Günther Anders' Critique of Ideology  4 M. N. Roy's Critique of Ideology, Fascism, and Nationalism  5 Martin Heidegger's Anti-Semitism: Philosophy of Technology and the Media in the Light of the Black Notebooks. Implications for the Reception of Heidegger in Media and Communication Studies  6 Anti-Semitism, Anti-Marxism, and Technophobia: The Fourth Volume of Martin Heidegger's Black Notebooks (1942-1948)  PART II: APPLICATIONS  7 Fascism 2.0: Hitler on Twitter  8 Red Scare 2.0: User-Generated Ideology in the Age of Jeremy Corbyn and Social Media.  9 Racism, Nationalism, and Right-Wing Extremism Online: The 2016 Austrian Presidential Election on Facebook  10 A Frankfurt School Perspective on Donald Trump and His Use of Social Media  11 Donald Trump and Neoliberal Fascism  12 Authoritarian Capitalism, Authoritarian Movements, Authoritarian Communication  13  Why There Are Certain Parallels Between Joachim C. Fest's Hitler-Biography and Michael Wolff's Trump-Book  14 How Did Donald Trump Incite a Coup Attempt?  15 Boris Johnson Takes His Brexit Demagoguery to the Social Media Sphere  16 Slow Media: How to Renew Debate in the Age of Digital Authoritarianism  PART III. CONCLUSION  Conclusion: What is Digital Fascism?

About the author

Christian Fuchs is a critical theorist of communication and society. He is co-editor of the journal tripleC: Communication, Capitalism & Critique. He is author of many publications, including the books Digital Capitalism (2022), Foundations of Critical Theory (2022), Communicating COVID-19: Everyday Life, Digital Capitalism, and Conspiracy Theories in Pandemic Times (2021), Marxist Humanism and Communication Theory (2021), Social Media: A Critical Introduction (3rd edition 2021), Communication and Capitalism: A Critical Theory (2020), Marxism: Karl Marx's Fifteen Key Concepts for Cultural and Communication Studies (2020), Nationalism on the Internet: Critical Theory and Ideology in the Age of Social Media and Fake News (2020), Rereading Marx in the Age of Digital Capitalism (2019), Digital Demagogue: Authoritarian Capitalism in the Age of Trump and Twitter (2016), Digital Labour and Karl Marx (2014), and Internet and Society (2008).

Summary

This fourth volume in Christian Fuchs’s Media, Communication and Society book series outlines the theoretical foundations of digital fascism and presents case studies of how fascism is communicated online.

Additional text

In this colossal collection of critical theory and analyses, Christian Fuchs shows off his brilliant expertise by integrating Marxist theories of fascism with its digital articulations across a range of online discourses. His exemplary detailed elaboration of pertinent conceptual roots is complemented by several empirical case studies including digital discourses of remembering Hitler on Twitter, anti-Corbyn campaign online, and Trumpian discourses of racism, nationalism, and fascism. In its data analysis, Fuchs makes excellent use of insights from Critical Discourse Studies and provides articulate and compelling contextualisation of the findings.

Majid KhosraviNik, Senior Lecturer in Digital Media & Discourse Studies at Newcastle University

In this highly informative and theoretically grounded book Christian Fuchs explores the rise of new forms of right-wing extremism online, in the era of Trump, Salvini and Bolsonaro, showing how social media has offered effective avenues for the growth of the populist right.
Paolo Gerbaudo, Senior Lecturer in Digital Culture and Society, King's College London

Report

"In this colossal collection of critical theory and analyses, Christian Fuchs shows off his brilliant expertise by integrating Marxist theories of fascism with its digital articulations across a range of online discourses. His exemplary detailed elaboration of pertinent conceptual roots is complemented by several empirical case studies, including digital discourses of remembering Hitler on Twitter, anti-Corbyn campaigns online, and Trumpian discourses of racism, nationalism, and fascism. In its data analysis, Fuchs makes excellent use of insights from Critical Discourse Studies and provides articulate and compelling contextualisation of the findings."

Majid KhosraviNik, Senior Lecturer in Digital Media & Discourse Studies at Newcastle University, UK
 
"In this highly informative and theoretically grounded book, Christian Fuchs explores the rise of new forms of right-wing extremism online, in the era of Trump, Salvini and Bolsonaro, showing how social media has offered effective avenues for the growth of the populist right."
Paolo Gerbaudo, Senior Lecturer in Digital Culture and Society, King's College London, UK

Product details

• Authors: Christian Fuchs, Christian (Paderborn University Fuchs
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd.
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 28.02.2022
• EAN: 9781032187600
• ISBN: 978-1-0-3218760-0
• No. of pages: 344
• Subjects: Non-fiction book > Politics, society, business > Society; Social sciences, law, business > Media, communication > Media science