"(Not) Welcome to Digital Germany"? Causes and Mechanisms of Cyber-Discrimination

As a concomitant symptom of the Corona pandemic, the digital arena has rapidly expanded as a venue for social interactions—both in Germany and worldwide. Hand in hand with this development, questions about digital discrimination are gaining relevance, both socially and scientifically. To date, however, there is hardly any research on (I) the situational causes of cyber-discrimination and (II) the situational mechanisms that lead to everyday discriminatory actions on the internet (e.g. based on ethnicity but also religion and/or gender).

With the project “(Not) Welcome to Digital Germany”? Causes and Mechanisms of Cyber-discrimination, we address these central research topics. Specifically, this project answers the following research questions: (1) What situational causes—for example, threats or fairness norms—and mechanisms influence discrimination in the digital space? (2) What role do ingroup and outgroup categorizations play in such processes? (3) Who discriminates against whom? (Ethnic) majorities against the minorities? Or also minorities against other minorities? (4) Beyond cause and effect, how do everyday discrimination mechanisms play out in the digital space? (5) In what ways are the circumstances of discrimination in digital and ‘real’ social spaces similar or different to each other?