[Air-L] My new book "Social Media as Fragile State"

[Caroline Haythornthwaite]

I am pleased to share with AoIR that my new book, "Social Media as Fragile State: Vulnerabilities, Pressures, and Human Rights” will be out in May (2026): https://www.degruyterbrill.com/document/isbn/9783111829920/html

This is a book length extension of ideas first presented in 2024 with Philip Mai and Anatoliy Gruzd. 
Haythornthwaite, C., Mai, P. & Gruzd, A. (2024). Social media as fragile state. 57th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences. Honolulu, HI. https://hdl.handle.net/10125/106679

Drawing on years of research of mine, and of many in AoIR, the book begins by examining the way that social media platforms take on characteristics of states, but fragile states. The book then outlines six “Social Media Fragility Indicators” derived from aggregating major issues facing society and social media platforms. Issues include technical and social threats, fragmentation, human rights, economic and external pressures. Rather than a classification system for every case facing social media, the indicators are presented as a framework for use in eliciting consideration of each category of fragility.

The book will be available in hardcover in May 2026, with digital and paperback versions to follow. 

Please recommend to your library, as well as considering for yourself!

/Caroline


Caroline Haythornthwaite
chaythor at syr.edu
Professor Emerita, School of Information Studies, Syracuse University
and School of Information Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign

https://haythorn.wordpress.com/