PART 2 ACADEMIC OVERVIEW 1. INTRODUCTION This part of the report reviews the literature on different aspects of the phenomenon of information disorder, with a focus on Asia. Academic literature and publications from globally recognized institutes and organizations have been taken into consideration. One hundred and fifty-six studies, covering twenty-five countries, have been considered in this review. The studies that have been reviewed use either quantitative or qualitative methods, depending on the theme of the study. Many case studies explaining the developments in the region have also been considered. Mixed methods and content analysis are commonly used as research approaches. The topic of information disorder has been approached from various perspectives, including media studies, political science, cognitive science, and computer science. India, the Philippines, Indonesia, Myanmar, and Japan are among the countries that have received a lot of attention from scholars, while countries such as Laos, Brunei, Timor-Leste, and Mongolia have received less. The remainder of this review is divided into three sections. The first discusses literature on the ecosystem of information disorder in the region, the second explores the literature on actions taken to counter the problem, and the third section summarizes the current research gaps in the field. I N FO R M ATI O N D I SO R D ER IN THE GLOBA L SOUTH 2. THE ECOSYSTEM OF INFORMATION DISORDER 2.1 FRAMEWORKS Scholars in the Asian region mainly rely on frameworks developed in other parts of the world to study the phenomenon, as there are no broad conceptual frameworks on the topic that have emerged from the region. “Fake news,” “misinformation,” “false information,” “hoaxes,” and “rumors” are terms used often in research in the region (Banerjee and Haque 2018; Kamplean 2020). The Council of Europe’s report on information disorder (Wardle and Derakhshan 2017) is used in a considerable amount of research (Banadaraike et al. 2021; Kamei 2021; Krishna 2021; Waghre and Seth 2020). This framework uses the dimensions of harm and falseness to distinguish between three types of information disorder: disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation. 2.2 TYPOLOGIES AND THEMES While some unique themes related to information disorder are found in specific Asian countries, there are also many common themes. The main themes related to information disorder prevalent in the region are politics, health, and entertainment Asia – 2 37