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Brethren in Terror: Mapping ISIS and Boko Haram Digital Campaigns
Abstract
Abstract
Scholars have increasingly sought commonalities among Islamist radical groups, such as ISIS
and Boko Haram, despite their ideological differences. The purpose of this qualitative study is
to conduct a comprehensive analysis of both ISIS and Boko Haram’s digital campaigns to
identify similarities and differences in the content of their digital messaging. Adopting
reflexive thematic analysis to explore and interpret dataset which eventually allows to
uncover patterns, themes, and meanings within the data, this study, utilized the "propaganda
by deed" theory to examines and analyse 20 ISIS Arabic Twitter campaigns and 20 Boko
Haram video messages. Data was collected and employed to NVivo software for coding and
analysis. The analysis reveals four prominent themes for each group: ISIS emphasizes
recruitment, direct calls to jihad, religious discourse, and commemoration of deceased
members to attract or mobilize followers. In contrast, Boko Haram's themes include
ideological declarations, religious narratives, affiliations with other groups, and recruitment
with calls to jihad. These findings provide a nuanced understanding of both groups, with
improved quality for digital campaign in the side of Boko Haram as a result of its allegiance
with ISIS, informing more effective and appropriate countermeasures against them and
further prevent possible future direct relationship between the two groups.
