A Comparative Content Analysis of Pro- Government and Pro-TPLF Social Media Activism in the Context of Ethiopia’s 2020-2022 Civil War
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Date
2024-06
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Addis Ababa Unversity
Abstract
This thesis is a comparative content analysis of Pro- government and Pro- TPLF activists
during the war and after the signing of the Agreement on Permanent Cessation of
Hostilities, also known as the Pretoria Agreement, in the context of the 2020-2022
Ethiopian civil war. The study argues that unlike the military confrontation in the
ground, those Pro-government and Pro-TPLF activists played major role in amplifying
and exacerbating the war through the social media warfare. It further argues that the
involvement of different actors behind each Pro-government and Pro-TPLF activists
makes the technological warfare and weaponization trend of social network more
complicated and dangerous to sustained peace. The study concludes based on the
findings that greater efforts are needed to ensure new mechanisms to understand the
nature, role, and dynamics of social media warfare. Therefore, media literacy work and
professional engagement in this field has to be seriously considered.
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Keywords
Activism, Manipulation, Social media warfare