The interplay of physical and digital authoritarianism: Methodological and theoretical challenges and approaches (Austria)

This Workshop seeks to advance scholarly debates on the intersection of offline and digital authoritarianism, while providing junior researchers with the opportunity to consolidate and refine their projects. Although existing studies have examined authoritarian practices in isolation, less attention has been paid to the interdependence between traditional, offline mechanisms of repression and their digitally mediated counterparts. By foregrounding this nexus, the Workshop will highlight how authoritarian strategies evolve across political systems, including democratic and authoritarian regimes. The Workshop will focus on developing novel theoretical frameworks, addressing methodological challenges, and identifying comparative approaches for systematically analysing these dynamics.