Destination unreachable – but for how long? The utility of Internet shutdowns in an increasingly digitalized world

Across the Global South, Internet shutdowns have become a popular instrument of digital authoritarianism to curb dissent during protests and elections. Despite their large-scale impacts on human rights, democratic processes, and the economy, we lack a comprehensive understanding of when and under which conditions digital authoritarians resort to this most blunt form of censorship. In this paper, I present a novel theory that explains the use of Internet shutdowns by examining their utility through the lens of a digital autocrat. I argue that the utility of Internet shutdowns is influenced by (1) the initial costs or barriers, such as the complexity of a shutdown, the availability of technology, skills, and the power over infrastructure; (2) the “effectiveness” of an Internet shutdown in containing dissent; (3) the consequential costs, in especially economic and societal costs; and (4) the availability of alternative instruments to suppress salient dissent or prevent it in the first place. As a consequence, the governments of increasingly digitalized economies are becoming more reluctant to deploy Internet shutdowns in general. Based on previous empirical studies, I find that while their initial costs remain cheap, their effectiveness is questionable and connected to immense consequential costs that increasingly outweigh their expected benefits. Furthermore, the growing adoption of information and communication technologies – mostly dual-use products – makes alternative instruments available, enriching the digital authoritarian toolkit. I conclude that governments are facing an increasing dilemma: while Internet shutdowns will not fully disappear from the digital autocrat’s toolkit – being a readily available, “just-in-time” means of choice against large-scale protests – their use will decrease as Internet connectivity increases in countries of the Global South. The theory described in this paper is not only useful for explaining the use and adoption of Internet shutdowns across time, cases, and regimes. More substantively, it serves to guide future research examining Internet shutdowns in an increasingly digitalized world by proposing specific assumptions and new testable hypotheses. Ultimately, I contribute societally, as the expectations derived from this theory may inform the advocacy work and Internet shutdown mitigation strategies of activists and civil society organizations in the future.