Intelligence Services on Social Media: Explaining Citizens’ Perceptions

• In Event: European Politics and Society Virtual Poster Session

Abstract

In the last decade a large number of public institutions, including intelligence services, make extensive use of social media to communicate with citizens. Much scholarly attention is paid to how intelligence agencies share information about their activities, seek to enhance transparency and accountability, or the content. However, we know very little about what happens at citizens’ end, when the information reaches the users. This paper addresses this gap in literature and analyzes how citizens perceive the information shared by intelligence services on social networks. If uses Romania as a single-case study and semi-structured interviews conducted in December 2020-January 2021 with citizens of different socio-demographic profiles to explain the variation in how they understand the information and how they assess its content. The paper seeks to test the explanatory power of several variables such as knowledge about contemporary events, attitudes towards security, media exposure, political preferences and predisposition to conspiracy theories. The paper also controls for several socio-demographic characteristics such as age, gender, education and medium of residence. The findings indicate that citizens’ perceptions are influenced by a combination of general attitudes towards the political system and society and specific attitudes about security and potential threats.

Author

• Raluca Lutai, Babeș Bolyai University