The challenge of digital data in R|EX research

Social media have become the preferred space for racist and far-right mobilisation, radicalisation and agitation. This is where racist and far-right content unfolds its impact, with the aim of attacking minorities, discrediting political dissidents, and ultimately destroying the free democratic order in Germany and other liberal democracies. 

The operators of the major platforms screen content to prevent hate speech and disinformation from being shared unfiltered. However, online actors use various circumvention strategies to get around this regulation: On the one hand, hate speech is disguised so that it is not obviously sanctioned as hate speech. On the other hand, actors use their reach on the major platforms to direct users to other platforms where racist and far-right content can be shared without the risk of sanctions or even criminal prosecution. 

This uninhibited online communication on often unchallenged, hateful content can reinforce extremist and misanthropic ways of thinking and contribute to radicalisation processes, which continue in the “offline world”, not least through concrete discrimination, exclusion and violence. Social media is therefore an area of growing importance for R|EX research. A major advantage is that social media data can be collected on a large scale. Internationally, an interdisciplinary field of research has emerged that aims to contribute to limiting extremist activities online through research. However, it is also noticeable that in German-speaking countries there is little existing data available for re-use (compared to Anglo-Saxon research) and relatively little preliminary work that can serve as best practice.