SOAS Research Online

Abstract

The objective of this study is to understand how cyberspace is used by foreign policy practitioners and the public as a mitigating platform for public diplomacy during regional conflicts. The latest hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan broke out in September 2020 in Karabakh region, which under international law belongs to Baku. Although the Iranian Government supports the Republic of Azerbaijan’s rights over the disputed area.But since the conflict began, relations between Tehran and Baku have been strained. The conflict in Karabakh generated waves of Turkic-nationalistic narratives in Baku combined with Turkey’s leadership reciting nationalistic poems that many members of the Iranian public view as a threat to their country’s territorial integrity. In a unique shift, the Iranian public, including pro and anti-regime activists, utilised cyberspace and social media as a tool to react to the perceived threats and to mitigate the risks to Iran’s territorial integrity. This article presents an argument that cyberspace is being used by conflicting sides to facilitate collaboration and communication between the Iranian public inside the country and their fellow compatriots in the diaspora, allowing them to share information and negotiate a public discourse and to exhibit national sensitivity over the issue. To test the hypothesis, the present study is devised to provide a rigorous empirical examination of the socio-political impact of the Karabakh conflict on the Iranian public and the state and how cyberspace is used to monitor and prevent the escalation of conflicts.