Camber Warren’s research explores how concepts of nationhood and group identity have evolved as the modern tools of mass communication have expanded into developing nations that are conflict-fragile.

Camber highlights Nigeria as the ‘textbook example’ of a nation where a disjuncture has arisen due to the appearance of smart phones and social media. The rich and vibrant mass media environment in the more developed south is now buttressing up against a rapidly developing social media infrastructure in the previously isolated north, which he contends is spurring on the existing religious and cultural divides – and perhaps even violence itself.

The Nigeria example contrasts with the high levels of national integration we find in Europe, which have among the oldest mass media infrastructures in the world. The new horizontal structures arising due to ICT appear to be threatening this in developing nations without this existing nationhood framework.

What are the best examples we can find in countries like Nigeria where mass media is being used to build bridges and encourage national solidarity, rather than disrupt it? Radio Dandal Kura, operating in northern Nigeria, broadcasts in the same languages used by Boko Haram and creates a new public sphere across the region that is dampening the effectiveness of extremists in recruiting and radicalizing.

Cell phones, in the aggregate, do appear to have enabled violence to be more easily organized, Camber claims. Establishing a stable, united nation will depend on these same tools encouraging a solidarity and a shared conversation that can overcome the divisions that, in some cases, have been exacerbated by ICT.