Sten Hansson
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View article: Government Communication on Social Media: Research Foci, Domains, and Future Directions
Government Communication on Social Media: Research Foci, Domains, and Future Directions Open
The aim of this review essay is to draw attention to the diversity of work done in the field of government social media communication research. It is a rapidly developing area of study that has been approached from multiple disciplinary pe…
View article: Communication‐Related Vulnerability of War Refugees: The Case of Ukrainians Escaping Russia's Invasion
Communication‐Related Vulnerability of War Refugees: The Case of Ukrainians Escaping Russia's Invasion Open
When war refugees arrive in a host country, they may find themselves in a vulnerable condition and struggle to cope in a foreign setting. This article presents a systematic approach to identifying important communication‐related challenges…
View article: Politicization of Government Social Media Communication: A Linguistic Framework and Case Study
Politicization of Government Social Media Communication: A Linguistic Framework and Case Study Open
Social media communication of government agencies should ideally be truthful and impartial to sustain public trust in government and support democratic goals. However, the politicization of agencies may harm the benefits that impartial and…
View article: Strengthening all-of-society approaches for disaster resilient societies through competency building: A European research agenda
Strengthening all-of-society approaches for disaster resilient societies through competency building: A European research agenda Open
The increasing frequency of disasters, alongside the recent COVID-19 pandemic, climate emergency, and ongoing/new crises including conflicts and their disproportionate impacts on many communities, all point towards the cascading, multidime…
View article: Coercive impoliteness and blame avoidance in government communication
Coercive impoliteness and blame avoidance in government communication Open
As government officeholders face criticism for misconduct or policy failures, they are tempted to communicate in self-defensive ways. In this paper, I draw attention to how strategic blame avoidance in government may involve coercive impol…
View article: Dialogic analysis of government social media communication: How commanding and thanking elicit blame
Dialogic analysis of government social media communication: How commanding and thanking elicit blame Open
During major crises, such as the Covid-19 pandemic, government officeholders issue commands to change people’s behaviour (e.g., ‘Stay at home!’) and express thanks to acknowledge the efforts of others and build solidarity. We use specialis…
View article: Mitigating vulnerabilities with social media: A cross‐national study of European disaster managers' practices
Mitigating vulnerabilities with social media: A cross‐national study of European disaster managers' practices Open
In this article, we provide an overview of the ways in which disaster managers in eight European countries use social media to mitigate people's vulnerability to hazards. Our document analysis and 95 expert interviews in Germany, Italy, Be…
View article: Strategies of Blaming on Social Media: An Experimental Study of Linguistic Framing and Retweetability
Strategies of Blaming on Social Media: An Experimental Study of Linguistic Framing and Retweetability Open
This article introduces an original theoretical model for understanding how the linguistic framing of political protest messages influences how blame spreads in social media. Our model of blame retweetability posits that the way in which t…
View article: European emergency managers on social media: institutional arrangements and guidelines
European emergency managers on social media: institutional arrangements and guidelines Open
Purpose This paper offers an empirical overview of European emergency managers' institutional arrangements and guidelines for using social media in risk and crisis communication. Design/methodology/approach The authors collected and analys…
View article: Persuasive Appeals in Genetic Biobank Recruitment Campaigns: Social and Ethical Implications
Persuasive Appeals in Genetic Biobank Recruitment Campaigns: Social and Ethical Implications Open
The social and ethical implications of large-scale biobank donor recruitment campaigns have remained understudied. We use two recent campaigns of the population-based genetic biobank in Estonia as an example to demonstrate how campaign spo…
View article: Building Resilience Against Hostile Information Influence Activities: How a New Media Literacy Learning Platform Was Developed for the Estonian Defense Forces
Building Resilience Against Hostile Information Influence Activities: How a New Media Literacy Learning Platform Was Developed for the Estonian Defense Forces Open
Modern societies are characterized by unprecedently broad and fast diffusion of various forms of false and harmful information. Military personnel’s motivation to defend their country may be harmed by their exposure to disinformation. Ther…
View article: Imagining and assessing future risks: A dynamic scenario‐based social vulnerability analysis framework for disaster planning and response
Imagining and assessing future risks: A dynamic scenario‐based social vulnerability analysis framework for disaster planning and response Open
While social vulnerability assessments should play a crucial part in disaster management, there is a lack of assessment tools that retain sensitivity to the situation‐specific dynamics of vulnerabilities emerging in particular hazard scena…
View article: The engagement of informal volunteers in disaster management in Europe
The engagement of informal volunteers in disaster management in Europe Open
Informal volunteering is increasingly important in disaster management, but authorities remain cautious about collaborating with informal volunteers. Relatively little is known about the extent to which informal volunteers are integrated i…
View article: Discursive Strategies of Blaming: The Language of Judgment and Political Protest Online
Discursive Strategies of Blaming: The Language of Judgment and Political Protest Online Open
Modern politics is permeated by blame games—symbolic struggles over the blameworthiness or otherwise of various social actors. In this article, we develop a framework for identifying different strategies of blaming that protesters use on s…
View article: Corpus-assisted analysis of legitimation strategies in government social media communication
Corpus-assisted analysis of legitimation strategies in government social media communication Open
When governments introduce controversial policies that many citizens disapprove of, officeholders increasingly use discursive legitimation strategies in their public communication to ward off blame. In this paper, we contribute to the stud…
View article: Legitimation in government social media communication: the case of the Brexit department
Legitimation in government social media communication: the case of the Brexit department Open
When governments introduce controversial policies or face a risk of policy failure, officeholders try to avoid blame and justify their decisions by using various legitimation strategies. This paper focuses on the ways in which legitimation…
View article: Linking resilience, vulnerability, social capital and risk awareness for crisis and disaster research
Linking resilience, vulnerability, social capital and risk awareness for crisis and disaster research Open
Crisis and disaster research has extensively contributed to theoretical, conceptual, methodological and empirical advances in the understanding of resilience, vulnerability, social capital and risk awareness. These concepts identify comple…
View article: Approaches to ‘vulnerability’ in eight European disaster management systems
Approaches to ‘vulnerability’ in eight European disaster management systems Open
While social vulnerability in the face of disasters has received increasing academic attention, relatively little is known about the extent to which that knowledge is reflected in practice by institutions involved in disaster management. T…
View article: Untruthful Brexit rhetoric has undermined representative democracy in the UK
Untruthful Brexit rhetoric has undermined representative democracy in the UK Open
Throughout the run-up to the signing of the EU-UK withdrawal agreement as well as the trade deal, the British government’s public rhetoric on Brexit has been criticised for being misleading and insincere. Sten Hansson (University of Tartu/…
View article: The six types of harmful information that make us more vulnerable during the pandemic
The six types of harmful information that make us more vulnerable during the pandemic Open
Fake remedies, misleading advice, false medical information: the creation, transmission, and consumption of false information have proliferated during the pandemic. Sten Hansson (University of Birmingham/University of Tartu) describes the …
View article: COVID-19 information disorder: six types of harmful information during the pandemic in Europe
COVID-19 information disorder: six types of harmful information during the pandemic in Europe Open
The outbreak of a novel coronavirus disease COVID-19 propelled the creation, transmission, and consumption of false information – unverified claims, misleading statements, false rumours, conspiracy theories, and so on – all around the worl…
View article: Communication-related vulnerability to disasters: A heuristic framework
Communication-related vulnerability to disasters: A heuristic framework Open
The concept of social vulnerability has been increasingly applied in disaster literature, but its communicative drivers have remained understudied. In this article, we put forward a heuristic framework for explaining how communication-rela…
View article: Vulnerability and vulnerable groups from an intersectionality perspective
Vulnerability and vulnerable groups from an intersectionality perspective Open
In general, the identification and protection of vulnerable groups in the case of hazards or when a crisis unfolds is an issue that any crisis and disaster risk management should address, since people have different levels of exposure to h…