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01. April 2021

Call for Papers: Sammelband 'Digital Fragmentations and Digital Sovereignty' (Deadline: 28.04.2021) Call for Papers: Sammelband 'Digital Fragmentations and Digital Sovereignty' (Deadline: 28.04.2021)

Digital Fragmentations and Digital Sovereignty
In the past years, a growing prominence of the idea of “digital sovereignty” as well as multiple data localization regulations have called the vision of a global, open Internet into question. Data
localization requirements could splinter the current global internet into many regional systems and shape innovation dynamics in a wider variety of data-utilizing sectors. Accordingly, the idea of the fragmentation or Balkanization of the Internet began to play a bigger role in debates on global Internet governance. This debate covers the Internet as an infrastructure as such and increasingly blurs the boundaries between geopolitics, national jurisdictions, and a power struggle for the future of global governance. The resulting discursive and policy fragmentations are likely going to be with us for a long time and many of the underlying tensions could intensify.

Against this background, this project advances theorizations and conceptual understandings of digital sovereignty and fragmentations in cyberspace. To take up the challenge of understanding
the problem of digital fragmentation and its interplay with the notion of “digital sovereignty”, we aim to theorize the degree to which the Internet is becoming or fragmented and the understand
the diver’s modes of fragmentation to which parts of the Internet are subjected, and which actors and processes are driving forces for fragmentation.

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Call for Papers
TRA 4 and CASSIS invite contributions for an edited volume about “Digital Fragmentations and Digital Sovereignty” as contribution to the international online-conference on “Digital
Fragmentations and Digital Sovereignty” (17-18 September 2021) with the goal to advance interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research cooperation on the topic of digital sovereignty, data
regulation, cyber security and internet governance.

We welcome submissions from disciplines such as political science, sociology, international relations, security studies, philosophy, public administration, law, information science, etc.
Suggested topics for analyses include, inter alia:
• Theoretical, empirical, or comparative analysis of digital sovereignty
• The conceptualization and taxonomies of Internet fragmentation
• Tensions between national Cybersecurity/digital sovereignty and free and open Internet
• Theoretical, empirical, or comparative analysis of data protection regulations
• Global Internet Governance and the power struggle between great powers
• International tech competition and digital fragmentation

Submission Guidelines
Draft papers will be considered for inclusion in the publication only if they have not been previously published. The length of the abstract submissions should be between 1500 and 2000 words. The length of the final submissions should be between 8 000 and 10 000 words. To facilitate the reviewing process, papers should not include author names or other information that would
help identify the authors. All submission shall be in English language. Authors shall use footnotes rather than endnotes and submission should be in Microsoft Word Text format (.docx).

Abstract submissions are due on 28 April 2021. They should include the following elements:
(1) Title
(2) Extended abstract (1 500-2 000 words)
(3) Author’s name, affiliation and short bibliographical note (in the body of the email)

Authors will be notified of the status of their contributions within approximately 3 weeks of the abstract submission deadline. Authors will also be invited to the conference on 17-18 September 2021. All submitted papers will be subject to peer review and will be judged based on the novelty of the contribution, the theoretical soundness, and the quality of presentation.
Authors of the selected submissions will be invited to submit the first drafts of their paper proposals (8 000-10 000 words) by 18 July 2021. Authors will be given the opportunity to improve
their contributions based on peer comments. Final drafts are due on 12 September 2021.

All submissions shall be sent to Dr. Ying Huang (yhuang@uni-bonn.de).

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