The presentation investigates the evolution of discourses, claims and actor positions during the German and French examination of legislation aimed at introducing state-mandated website blocking measures of sexual child images (often referred to as “child pornography”). The focus lies on the opportunities and difficulties for opponents of internet blocking measures to form discourse coalitions that challenge the frames articulated and nor- malised by power elites. While critics of mandatory internet blocking have been ignored at the outset of the debate, their frames have even- tually been adopted and debated by proponents of internet blocking in Germany. Activists successfully criticised the effectiveness of introducing internet blocking measures, which lead to the final abandonment of the legislation. In France, the debate remained confined to the online media where critics voiced their opposition but did not succeed in influencing the broader policy agenda that was primarily concerned with security issues. Both cases are then contrasted with similar debates at the EU level. All three cases offer important insights for the study of internet filtering and blocking from a comparative perspective.

1. Discourse Networks on State-mandated access
blocking in France and Germany
Yana Breindl
Göttingen Centre for Digital Humanities
Georg-August Universität Göttingen, Germany
5 November 2012

2. Outline.
Internet blocking
Political discourse networks
Methods
Findings
Conclusions

3. Internet blocking in liberal democracies
I A global norm, not an exception.
I Three trends (McIntyre, 2012):
I Finding technological solutions for policy problems (Lessig‘s
“code as law”)
I Indirect enforcement through intermediaries
I Preference for self-regulation
I Raises legal, political and technical questions in terms of
democratic principles and practical implementation.

4. Internet Blocking in Western Europe
I UK: Self-regulatory mechanisms imposed under threat of
regulation.
I EU: CIRCAMP project producing CSAADF filter on UK
model. Attempt to introduce blocking through directive in
2011.
I Germany: Initial self-regulatory agreement led to calls for a
specific blocking law.
I France: LOPPSI 2 broad security bill, including censorship of
‘obvious’ child pornography without a court order.

5. Political discourse networks
I Discourse constrains political action (Schmidt, 2008; Schmidt
and Radaelli, 2004)
I Importance of frames for movement mobilisation (Snow and
Benford, 1992)
I Discourse coalitions around shared storylines (Hajer, 1993) or
narratives

6. Successful discourse coalitions
I Large constituency
I Dominate core frames of a conflict
I Internal, strong ideational congruence
I Consistent storyline
I Broad but not too diverse frame bundle
I Stable over time
(Leifeld and Haunss, 2012, 385)

7. Methods: Discourse network analysis
I Combines social network analysis with computer-assisted,
qualitative content analysis (Leifeld, 2009; Leifeld and Haunss,
2010, 2012)
I Congruence networks

8. Methods: Discourse network analysis
I Combines social network analysis with computer-assisted,
qualitative content analysis (Leifeld, 2009; Leifeld and Haunss,
2010, 2012)
I Congruence networks

9. Methods: Discourse network analysis
I Germany
I 266 articles
I Tageszeitung, Frankfurter Rundschau, Süddeutsche Zeitung,
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Die Welt
I 1 867 coded statements
I 17 frames
I 176 persons belonging to 109 organisations
I France
I 76 articles
I Le Monde, Libération, Le Figaro (including online versions)
I 265 coded statements
I 13 frames
I 63 persons, 48 organisations

10. Findings
Internet blocking became a political and media issue in Germany,
not in France. Differences in:
I Scope of bills
I Federal v. centralised state
I German elections
I Constitutional court in France
I Structure of discourse networks

11. Germany
Access Impediment Act (ZugErschwG)

12. Germany
Opponents v. proponents network

13. Germany
Core frames

14. Germany
Frame alignment

15. Germany
Congruence over time
I Number of actors: more opponents than proponents
I Opponents more densely connected
I Opponents’ clustering strongly increases in phase three

16. France
Loi d’orientation et de programmation pour la performance de la sécurité intérieure
(LOPPSI 2)

17. France
Opponents v. proponents networks

18. France
Core frames

19. France
Frame alignment

20. France
Congruence over time
I More opponents than proponents
I Proponents decrease in phase two in terms of density and
clustering
I Proponents more densely connected towards beginning and
end of debate

21. Conclusions
Germany France
Opponents more numerous Opponents more numerous
Broad opposition across all Broad opposition, Telcos in
actors, politicians divided favour
Core frames dominated by Proponents dominated
opponents, proposed principled, avoided practical
alternative debate
Broad bundling by opponents Opponents main frame not
well bundled with others
Opponents more cohesive over Proponents highly connected
time at beginning and end of debate

22. Conclusions
Current research
I Comparative public policy analysis of ca. 20 liberal
democracies
I What type of content regulations (self-, co-, legislative) are in
place? What type of blocking mechanisms are used?
I How open, focused, transparent and accountable are content
restrictions?
I Influence of discursive and institutional variables on content
regulation

23. Contact details
Yana Breindl
yana.breindl@sowi.uni-goettingen.de