There is no doubt that the Internet has radically changed social life and politics, how citizens and power interact with each other. Social networks and messengers have become a symbol, a tool for protests and color revolutions around the world. The situation looks so that the penetration of the Internet is almost guaranteed to an increase in a critical attitude to the authorities. In a joint and ear, a “economy on an ear”, Rash Resen Yenikolopov, a Professor of the Economics of the Institute for Political Research of Sciences PO in Paris, Sergei Guriev, is not always true with the Russian economic school.

The flat world of the Internet

Thanks to the Internet, billions of users around the world created a web of new horizontal connections, which is little affected by government and traditional media. This is a new level of access to voters who never had novice politicians. What did the populists did not fail, whose influence has sharply grew in the era of social networks. Inside social networks, simple messages spread the fastest, and populists are most effectively able to work with simple, even simplified ideas.

The era of smartphones

The spread of mobile broadband Internet (3G technology) actively contributed to the growth of critical mood of citizens to their governments around the world, the liberalization of society. Including because the mobile broadband Internet allowed to instantly spread not only the text, but also the videos, the emotional impact of which is much higher.

"In contact" with protests

The study of the Russian Economic School proved a direct connection between the audience in contact and the protests of 2011 - the more popular the social network in certain cities was, the more people went out into the streets. It could be assumed that the social network increased the negative moods of voters, but this is a mental trap. In general, the average user in contact did not experience a strong negativity at this time in relation to the government. But a relatively small part of citizens who were originally configured to the authorities were able to better coordinate their actions thanks to this social network, find each other and go to protests together.

Does the Internet go to the dark side of strength?

Previously, the Internet, social networks, messengers were unambiguously perceived as a means of liberalization of society. But the farther, the more and more social networks become an instrument of dark destructive forces - not only ardent populists, but also ultra -conservators, extremists, and conspiracy therapists. They use the fact that on the Internet there are very few barriers to disseminate information, and deliberately promote fake-nuis and alternative facts. Internet platforms only learn to deal with fake-nuis.

Nevertheless, in general, the low threshold of entering the social network allows you to compete on equal terms with the small new parties and the largest, long -have formed political movements, spurred politicians to communicate more with citizens, more efficiently respond to their needs. Such competition is good for voters.

Neutrality no longer works

The latest events in America, the potential impeachment of President Donald Trump after trying to tear the transition of the authorities to Joe Biden, is a striking example of the very dark side of the Internet. Trump and his supporters used Twitter and other social networks to spread fakes about elections and to coordinate the attack on the Capitol.

And the fact that Twitter, Facebook, and after them, other social networks and messengers blocked Trump's accounts and its supporters-the cardinal shift of the paradigm for Internet platforms. Until now, platforms stubbornly defended their right to neutrality - they insisted that they were only a platform and users themselves are responsible for content. But now they have acted as the Internet police. And it is unlikely that they will be so easy to remove this cap and return to the role of the observer - either they themselves will moderate the content, or the network police will create governments.

Voters are increasingly faced with the dark side of the Internet