Dr Gregory Asmolov

About me

Thesis: Subject, crowd and the governance of activity: The role of digital tools in emergency response (2016). .

Biography and Research

Since October 2017, Gregory works on a research project as a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow at the Russia Institute, King’s College London. His work focuses on how information technologies, specifically social media and crowdsourcing platforms, constitute the role of individual users and crowds in crisis situations. Whereas Gregory's PhD thesis examined how Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) mediate different modes of the relationship between individuals and the state in natural disasters, his present research investigates this very relationship in the context of warfare.

Gregory's current project titled “Participatory Warfare: the Role of ICTs in Modern Conflicts” explores how ICTs change the everyday lives of users who are remote from a zone of conflict, and how ICTs contribute to the participation of their users in warfare. The project seeks to contribute to understanding the role of digital mediation in the relationship between users and conflicts, and to build a detailed picture of the forms of civic engagement in modern warfare. In order to investigate whether and how social networks foster the convergence of everyday life and warfare, and how digitally mediated practices contribute to citizen engagement in conflicts, he focuses primarily on the conflict between Russia and Ukraine.

Gregory's additional research interests include Internet regulation in Russia, the role of ICTs in areas of limited statehood, and the role of digital networks in the emergence of alternative socio-political spaces. He is particularly interested in exploring the tension between the Internet as an alternative socio-political space and the sovereignization of the online space by state actors.

Journal articles

Asmolov, G. & Kolozaridi, P. (2017). “The Imaginaries of RuNet: the Change of the Elites and the Construction of Online Space”, Russian Politics, 2, pp. 54-79. Available at:
Asmolov, G. (2015). “Vertical Crowdsourcing in Russia: Balancing Governance of Crowds and State–Citizen Partnership in Emergency Situations”, Policy & Internet, 7:3, pp. 292-318, DOI: 10.1002/poi3.96 Available at:
Asmolov, G. (2015). ‘Crowdsourcing and the folksonomy of emergency response: The construction of a mediated subject’, Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture, 6: 2, pp. 155–178, DOI: 10.1386/iscc.6.2.155_1 Available at:
Livingston S. and G. Asmolov, (2010). “Networks and the Future of Foreign Affairs Reporting”, Journalism Studies, 11: 5, Routledge, pp. 745 — 760. Available at:

Book chapters

Asmolov, G. (2018, forthcoming). Vertical crowdsourcing (Russia) in A. Ledeneva, A. Bailey, S. Barron, C. Curro & Teague E. (Eds.), “The Global Encyclopaedia of Informality:Understanding of Social & Cultural complexity”, Vol. 2, Chapter 8.13, London: UCL Press, pp. 461-465.
Asmolov, G. (2014). Virtual Rynda – The Atlas of Help: Mutual Aid as a Form of Social Activism: Crowdsourcing in transition from emergency to everyday life, in E. Zuckerman & L. LeJeune (Eds.), “Global Dimensions of Digital Activism.”, MIT Center For Civic Media. Available at:
Asmolov, G. (2013). Natural Disasters and Alternative Modes of Governance: the Role of Social Networks and Crowdsourcing Platforms in Russia in S. Livingston & G. Walter-Drop(Eds.), “Bits and Atoms Information and Communication Technology in Areas of Limited Statehood”, Oxford University Press. Available at:
Asmolov, G. (2013). The Kremlin's Cameras and Virtual Potemkin Villages: ICT and the Construction of Statehood, in S. Livingston & G. Walter-Drop (Eds.), “Bits and Atoms Information and Communication Technology in Areas of Limited Statehood”, Oxford University Press. Available at:
Asmolov, G. (2013). “Dynamics of innovation and the balance of power in Russia” in M. M. Hussain & P. N. Howard (Eds.), “State Power 2.0 Authoritarian Entrenchment and Political Engagement Worldwide”, Ashgate. Available at:
Asmolov, A. and Asmolov, G. (2009). “From We-Media to I-Media: Identity Transformations in the Virtual World” in Y. Zinchenko & V. Petrenko (Eds.), Psychology in Russia. State of the Art, Scientific Yearbook, Volume 2. Available at

Conference proceedings

Asmolov, G. (2014). Crowdsourcing as an Activity System: Online Platforms as Mediating Artifacts. A Conceptual Framework for the Comparative Analysis of Crowdsourcing in Emergencies, in M. Poblet, P. Noriega & E. Plaza (Eds.), Proceedings of the Sintelnet WG5 Workshop on Crowd Intelligence: Foundations, Methods and Practices, pp. 24-43. Available at:

Policy papers and reports

Asmolov G., Welcoming the Dragon: the role of public opinion in Russian Internet regulation, The Center for Global Communication Studies (CGCS), Annenberg School for Communication (University of Pennsylvania), February 201, Available at:
Asmolov G. and J. Machleder, Social Change and the Russian Network Society: Redefining Development Priorities in New Information Environments, Internews, September 2011, Available at:
Latar N., G. Asmolov & A. Gekker, State Cyber Advocacy, A Working Paper for the Herzliya Conference 2010, IDC Herzliya, Available at:

Selected research blog posts and podcasts:

Asmolov G., Technology is Changing How We Interact with and Experience Conflict, Center for Media, Data and Society, Central European University, April 15, 2016. Available at:
Asmolov G., Controlling the crowd? Government and citizen interaction on emergency-response platforms, The Policy and Internet Blog, Oxford Internet Institute, December 2015. Available at:
Asmolov G.., Between institutional dungeons and the dragons of public opinion: Russian Internet regulation, 杏吧论坛 Media Policy Project Blog, February 2015. Available at:
Asmolov G., Crowdsourcing and Development of Activity Systems: the Case of Emergency Response, Oxford Internet Institute, February 2014. Available at:
Asmolov G., A Shift in International Information Security: The Story of a Diplomatic Oxymoron, Center for Global Communication Studies, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania December 16. Available at: 2013,
Asmolov G., The balance of crowds: top-down and bottom-up mobilization strategies in Russian election campaign, Polis blog, March 3^rd, 2012. Available at:
Asmolov G., Russian Elections: the struggle for power between state and network society, March 1^st, 2012. Available at:

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