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Background Digital platforms have become dominant players in contemporary societies by positioning themselves as key sites for social communication and transactions (van Dijck, 2013). With platform governance becoming a major concern, scholars have increasingly turned their attention to the ways how platforms perform this intermediary role – most notably to algorithms, practices and policies (Gillespie, 2014; Roberts, 2016; DeNardis & Hackl, 2015). What is still scarce, is (a) research that frames and explains these phenomena with key concepts of social theory, and (b) longitudinal studies that track these developments over time. This paper contributes to the debate theoretically by establishing a concept of platform governance as reflexive coordination based on institutional theory, and empirically by presenting a longitudinal study (2005-2016) that combines the analysis of Facebook's evolving policies and practices on controversial content (nudity, hate speech, fake news) with a policy and discourse analysis. Theorizing Platform Governance as Reflexive Coordination Governance is widely used as an umbrella term for all sorts of ordering and regulation processes. Yet, it is a notoriously slippery term that often remains vague and difficult to operationalize, repeatedly conflated with the term regulation. This conceptual weakness is reflected in the literature on platform governance. Governance of p latforms usually refers to public policy measures that try to steer platforms dynamics towards common good (safe harbor, tax and competition policy); governance by p latforms addresses companies' own measures (policies, algorithms) to influence behavior on their platform But this conflation of governance and regulation diminishes the concepts' analytical value. Neither the side effects of actions and processes pursuing non-regulatory goals (such as Facebook optimizing its platform for engagement), nor the role of public Platform Governance as Reflexive Coordination – Mediating Nudity, Hate Speech and Fake News on ...

Die Verfasser legen eine Bestandsaufnahme der Entstehungsprozesse von Piratenparteien im internationalen Kontext vor. Sie skizzieren den Kontext transnational-sozialer Bewegungen rund um Fragen von Urheberrecht und geistigem Eigentum, in dem die Piratenpartei als ebenfalls transnationale Bewegung entstanden ist. Dann versuchen sie, anhand eines Vergleichs von Piratenparteien in ausgewählten Ländern deren jeweilige lokale Verankerung und damit auch Unterschiedlichkeit zu illustrieren, bevor das Beispiel der deutschen Piratenpartei im Spannungsfeld aus lokaler Besonderheit und globaler Bezüglichkeit behandelt wird. Abschließend skizzieren die Verfasser mögliche Bereiche für weitergehende Forschung zum transnationalen Charakter des Phänomens Piratenpartei. (ICE2)

Presently, we are witnessing an intense debate about technological advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) research and its deployment in various societal domains and contexts. In this context, media and communications is one of the most prominent and contested fields. Bots, voice assistants, automated (fake) news generation, content moderation and filtering – all of these are examples of how AI and machine learning are transforming the dynamics and order of digital communication.

On 20 March 2018 the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society together with the non-governmental organisation Access Now hosted the one-day expert workshop "The turn to AI in governing communication online". International experts from academia, politics, civil society and business gathered in Berlin to discuss the complex socio-technical questions and issues concerning subjects such as artificial intelligence technologies, machine learning systems, the extent of their deployment in content moderation and the range of approaches to understanding the status and future impact of AI systems for governing
social communication on the internet.

This workshop report summarises and documents the authors' main takeaways from the discussions. The discussions, comments and questions raised and responses from experts also fed into the report. The report has been distributed among workshop participants. It is intended to contribute current perspectives to the discourse on AI and the governance of communication.

Following recent theoretical contributions, this article suggests a new approach to finding the governance in Internet governance. Studies on Internet governance rely on contradictory notions of governance. The common understanding of governance as some form of deliberate steering or regulation clashes with equally common definitions of Internet governance as distributed modes of ordering. Drawing on controversies in the broader field of governance and regulation studies, we propose to resolve this conceptual conundrum by grounding governance in mundane activities of coordination. We define governance as reflexive coordination – focusing on those 'critical moments', when routine activities become problematic and need to be revised, thus, when regular coordination itself requires coordination. Regulation, in turn, can be understood as targeted public or private interventions aiming to influence the behaviour of others. With this distinction between governance and regulation, we offer a conceptual framework for empirical studies of doing Internet governance.

Following recent theoretical contributions, this article suggests a new approach to finding the governance in Internet governance. Studies on Internet governance rely on contradictory notions of governance. The common understanding of governance as some form of deliberate steering or regulation clashes with equally common definitions of Internet governance as distributed modes of ordering. Drawing on controversies in the broader field of governance and regulation studies, we propose to resolve this conceptual conundrum by grounding governance in mundane activities of coordination. We define governance as reflexive coordination – focusing on those 'critical moments', when routine activities become problematic and need to be revised, thus, when regular coordination itself requires coordination. Regulation, in turn, can be understood as targeted public or private interventions aiming to influence the behaviour of others. With this distinction between governance and regulation, we offer a conceptual framework for empirical studies of doing Internet governance.

The intricate relationship between Internet, on the one hand, and Human Rights, on the other, is increasingly becoming relevant in foreign policy. Discussions are animated by different actors, providing contributions from multiple perspectives, yet the debate on Internet and Human Rights is still fragmented and has not evolved into a unified agenda. This paper explores this on-going debate over competing perspectives, and frames the current discussion on Internet and Human Rights in foreign policy by providing an overview of the key governmental conferences addressing the Internet and Human rights over the first 3 years (2010-2012) since the beginning of the debate. It then proceeds to analyze key narratives, stakeholders and agendas within these conferences, as well as questions of power and legitimacy. Finally, it argues that the conferences draw from a common discourse and language, but are also representing divergent agendas between stakeholders and states.