The (political) use of the internet by National States in the context of world-society: an observation of the Russian case and the apparent intrinsic deterritorialization of the internet

Abstract

This article aims to raise a few questions about the relationship of World-Society with the internet from the observation of a specific case: the role of the Russian government in its attempts to control and censor cyber content. The starting point was to observe the observations of systemic theorists regarding this relationship, pointing out its blind spots. Namely, a naive and overly optimistic treatment of some authors in relation to the cosmopolitan potential of the internet and its architecture which made the complex problems involving the regulation of the network and the national legal systems invisible. Next, we work with the concept of peripheral modernity as a category of analysis and description capable of encompassing and supplying, at least partially, these blind spots, especially in the Russian case. Then, we analyze the context of Russia's insertion in the cyber world and some examples of state efforts to control the network. Finally, we point out that the internet (as an instrument or medium) may be useful not only to break with nationalist logic but, paradoxically, to reinforce it.