BEYOND SYRIA IRAQ

LOCAL POPULAR SUPPORT FOR THE ISLAMIC STATE
Social Media
■ DAVEED GARTENSTEIN-ROSS
PREPARED STATEMENT
ANALYSTS HAVE INCREASINGLYsought to understand what social
media can tell us about militant groups’ strengths and capabilities.
The use of social media as a tool to gain a better understanding of
violent nonstate actors (VNSAs) is still in its infancy, and methodologies
and best practices are still being developed. While social media–based analysis
has yielded at times great insight into the Islamic State, it has also led
to some analytical pitfalls, as IS has determinedly exaggerated its successes
and skillfully disguised many of its setbacks. This article focuses on using
social media as a tool for assessing local support for IS.
Social media cannot be the sole lens through which analysts seek to
understand militant groups, and, indeed, analysts should be cautious
of overreliance on it as an explanatory tool. The natural habitat of most
VNSAs is in the shadows rather than the limelight. When IS began to
loudly advertise its campaign to pry away al-Qaeda’s affiliates, many analysts
interpreted the latter’s relatively muted response and dearth of social
media support as signs that IS was highly likely to gobble up al-Qaeda’s
network. This has not occurred, and, in fact, al-Qaeda has been highly
effective at clamping down on nascent IS support within its ranks. Al-
Qaeda and its allies have militarily punished groups that had the temerity
to break away and join IS. 1 The early overestimation of IS’s likely ability to
break up al-Qaeda’s network should serve as a cautionary tale, and it is one
reason social media–based analysis should always be cross-checked against
all other available sources of information, including local/regional press
reporting, academic analyses, and on-the-ground sources.
Since, as mentioned, the use of social media as an analytical tool for
50