English abstracts
Abstrakti
Saara Jansson & Tanja Sihvonen
Cyber security as governmental domain
and the threats to it
Reliable information and communication technology systems are crucially important components in the basic infrastructure of the information society, but they are not independent of political ideologies, raisons d’être of nation-states, or commercial interests. This theoretically oriented article investigates and conceptualises this infrastructure as a “cyber domain”. As the existence of the cyber domain is defined through various kinds of threats, our interest is directed towards cybersecurity issues. The objective of this article is thus, first, to analyse the concept of cybersecurity, and second, to help us understand what kind of a societal phenomenon cybersecurity appears to be in light of texts such as governmental cyber strategies and news journalism. This research will show that cybersecurity is connected to the core functionalities of computer networks while being a controversial societal phenomenon. News related to cyber crime are focused on the uncontrollability of cyber threats and strong actors that fight against them. National cyber strategies, on the other hand, are a way for nation states to help clear the confusion about governmental surveillance over their citizens and assure them that these cyber activities are actually aimed at their benefit.
Key words: Keywords: cyberspace, cyber security, cyber security strategy, information networks, information warfare
Ville Kumpu
Reason or the roach?
Jobs, environmental protection and the dispute over the Lievestuore pulp mill
This article examines the discursive construction of labor and environmental protection in the news coverage of the 1971 dispute over the Lievestuore pulp mill. The dispute originated when the mill, which had been shut down four years earlier, was restarted without a wastewater permit required by the law and culminated in the workers’ occupation of the mill after the Water Right Court had ruled the launch of the mill illegal and issued sanctions. The Lievestuore dispute is an interesting example of how the environmental awakening that had emerged at the turn of the decade connected rhetorically with more commonsensical perspectives on what is important and rational. According to the analysis presented in this article, the dispute was constructed as a dispute over jobs rather than dispute over the environment.
Key words: journalism, environmental conflicts, environmental protection, water protection, wood industry
Auli Harju
Online discussion as a contact zone
The article views Suomi24 forum as a contact zone where people with different backgrounds come together. In the forum a variety of different world views and opinions meet and occasionally collide. The analysis is based on the open-ended questions of an online survey conducted by Citizen Mindscapes project in 2016 for forum users about the positive and negative emotions experienced in discussions. The users felt burdened because of flaming, trolling, and hate speech. However, they also embraced the forum as the last frontier of free speech, where one can express freely and anonymously opinions that are considered inappropriate in the society in general. Despite being overwhelmed by negative tones in forum discussions, users highly appreciated peer support, information sharing and meaningful contacts with other users in the forum.
Key words: anonymity, discussion forum, user survey, social media
Laura Ahva
Anchoring practices of participatory journalism
This article examines the practices that make participatory journalism possible. Participatory journalism here refers to such forms of collaborative publishing that rely on non-journalists who can co-decide over the journalistic process and through that have an impact on the public sphere. The article focuses on three European outlets that apply the idea of participation slightly differently in their practices. Voima is an alternative monthly magazine published with the help of a vast network of semi-professional contributors based in Finland, Cafébabel is a participatory online magazine with non-paid contributors operating in France and other European countries, and Södra Sidan is a public journalism style local newspaper that collaborates with local residents in Sweden. Empirical material consists of observation diaries and photographs from the three central newsrooms and interviews with journalists and participants. Theoretically, the article draws form practice theory. The analysis utilizes the concept of ‘practice’ and the research material is coded according to three core elements of practice: materiality, activity and meaning. Participation in the three organizations is made possible through four underlying anchoring practices: emotional labour, mobility, resource management and quality control. These four anchors together maintain the practice of participation, but at the same time, it is clear that they are contradictory and do not share power in an equal manner between journalists and non-journalists.
Key words: Anchoring practices, journalism studies, multi-sited ethnography, participation, participatory journalism, practice, practice theory
