Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This paper focuses on the intersection between digital governance and authoritarian resilience. It uses Hungary as a case study to explore how electoral autocracies instrumentalize digital regulation to consolidate power. Instead of looking into platform regulation policies or analyzing competing notions of digital sovereignty within the EU, the paper examines how regulatory initiatives such as the Digital Services Act (DSA) can serve as tools of control used by electoral autocracy. Despite criticism for diverging from the EU values, Hungary supports initiatives such as the DSA, which allows the regime to operate in a system driven by liberal democratic values. Thus, the normative level of digital governance at the EU level is challenged by empirical actions and perceptions embedded in an electoral democracy.
Author: Asya Metodieva
Institution: Institute of International Relations Prague
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: hybrid
OpenAlex ID: W4413202201