Political Warfare: Competition in the Cyber Era

The concept of political warfare is not new. Today however, with the emergence of cyberspace as the fifth domain of war, the scope of political warfare, its diversity and level of sophistication signify a break from past experience. What the early ideas about political warfare identified as propaganda, psychological operations or a race for the hearts and minds of the population is now possible to be applied on a massive scale, never seen before. This article offers a new frame of reference for an old problem. In order to assess and adapt to the complex nature of inter-state competition in the cyber era, we need to understand how information technology is raising the relative importance of political warfare, by transforming the social environment and its instruments of operation. Furthermore, although information technology is a neutral variable, the openness that describes western societies multiplies the vulnerability of liberal democracies to political warfare. As a result, authoritarian regimes, terrorist groups and other revisionary forces of the twenty-first century are undermining democracy and freedom around the world by targeting the network society and by establishing new, virtual spheres of influence.