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Freedom of Expression and Defamation

Freedom of Expression and Defamation is a research topic within Law. Science Explorer counts 5.8k research works in it since 1950. 10.6% of them reached the world's top 10% most cited for their field and year.

This cluster of papers explores the intersection of human rights law, freedom of expression, and the regulation of speech in various contexts such as defamation, internet governance, surveillance, and social media. It also delves into the ethical considerations in scientific research and the implications for international law.

  • Human Rights
  • Defamation
  • Internet Regulation
  • Freedom of Expression
  • Surveillance
  • Authorship Studies
  • Social Media
  • Cybercrime
  • Ethics in Science
  • International Law
Research works
5.8k
fractional, since 1950
In the world top 10%
611
per year above
Top-10% rate
10.6%
share of its works in the world top 10%
Growth, 2018-21 → 2022-25
+10%
the tick is no change
Largest producer
United States
36% of the 10 largest, 2022-now
Freedom of Expression and Defamation

Which countries lead Freedom of Expression and Defamation research?

By volume, the United States and the United Kingdom publish the most (290 and 119 works in 2022-now).

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 United States 290 works
  2. 2 United Kingdom 119 works
  3. 3 Germany 82 works
  4. 4 Australia 67 works
  5. 5 India 66 works
  6. 6 China 51 works
  7. 7 Indonesia 37 works
  8. 8 Canada 34 works
  9. 9 Türkiye 32 works
  10. 10 France 30 works

How concentrated that is

The same countries as shares of everything the list above accounts for. A node where two countries do two thirds of the work and one spread evenly across twelve read alike as a ranking and not at all alike here.

United States: 35.9%United Kingdom: 14.7%Germany: 10.2%Australia: 8.2%6 others listed: 30.9%36%largest
United States290 · 35.9%United Kingdom119 · 14.7%Germany82 · 10.2%Australia67 · 8.2%6 others listed250 · 30.9%

Shares of the rows listed above, not of the whole node.

Which institutions lead Freedom of Expression and Defamation research?

By volume in 2022-now, University of Cambridge publishes the most Freedom of Expression and Defamation research, followed by University of Oxford and Hexagon (United Kingdom).

By volume, 2022-now

  1. 1 University of CambridgeUnited Kingdom 9 works
  2. 2 University of OxfordUnited Kingdom 8 works
  3. 3 Hexagon (United Kingdom)United Kingdom 7 works
  4. 4 The University of SydneyAustralia 7 works
  5. 5 The University of MelbourneAustralia 7 works
  6. 6 University of AmsterdamNetherlands 6 works
  7. 7 Centre National de la Recherche ScientifiqueFrance 5 works
  8. 8 Semantic Designs (United States)United States 5 works
  9. 9 Université de MontpellierFrance 5 works
  10. 10 KU LeuvenBelgium 5 works

Who are the leading researchers in Freedom of Expression and Defamation?

The most-cited researchers publishing on Freedom of Expression and Defamation include David Hume.

  1. 1 David Hume Australia 107k citations

Ranked by citations received across their whole record, among researchers with at least three works on this topic.

What are the most cited papers in Freedom of Expression and Defamation?

The most cited paper in Freedom of Expression and Defamation is "On Face-Work" (Erving Goffman, 1955), with 2,865 citations. Next come "Hateful Symbols or Hateful People? Predictive Features for Hate Speech Detection on Twitter" (1,678) and "SemEval-2019 Task 5: Multilingual Detection of Hate Speech Against Immigrants and Women in Twitter" (873).

Most cited papers
#PaperReleasedCitations
1 On Face-Work Erving Goffman · Psychiatry Aug 1955 2,865
2 Hateful Symbols or Hateful People? Predictive Features for Hate Speech Detection on Twitter Zeerak Waseem, Dirk Hovy Conference paperOpen access 2016 1,678
3 SemEval-2019 Task 5: Multilingual Detection of Hate Speech Against Immigrants and Women in Twitter Valerio Basile, Cristina Bosco, Elisabetta Fersini et al. Conference paperOpen access 2019 873
4 Are You a Racist or Am I Seeing Things? Annotator Influence on Hate Speech Detection on Twitter Zeerak Waseem Conference paperOpen access 2016 585
5 The New Governors: The People, Rules, and Processes Governing Online Speech Kate Klonick · St. John's University School of Law (St. John's University) Apr 2018 584
All 102 most cited papers, with filters and sorting

Where is Freedom of Expression and Defamation research done?

The largest centres of Freedom of Expression and Defamation research in 2022-now are New York (United States), London (United Kingdom), Sydney (Australia) and Melbourne (Australia).

Largest cities, 2022-now

  1. 1 New YorkUnited States 26 works
  2. 2 LondonUnited Kingdom 24 works
  3. 3 SydneyAustralia 19 works
  4. 4 MelbourneAustralia 17 works
  5. 5 Washington D.C.United States 13 works
  6. 6 BeijingChina 12 works
  7. 7 BerlinGermany 11 works
  8. 8 CambridgeUnited Kingdom 11 works
  9. 9 New DelhiIndia 10 works
  10. 10 AmsterdamNetherlands 10 works
See Freedom of Expression and Defamation on the map

Where is the best place to study Freedom of Expression and Defamation?

Among universities, judged by research, University of Cambridge score highest, combining citation excellence, specialisation, size, growth and international reach. Research strength is one signal when choosing where to study; it does not measure teaching.

Citation excellenceshare of its work in the world top 10%, 2022-now and all time averaged
40%
Specialisationhow much of its work is in this field, counted up to 10× the world share
10%
Sizeits output in this field, on a log scale
30%
Growthoutput growth, counted from -20% to +20%
10%
Internationalshare of its work with a co-author abroad
10%
Each slider sets a weight; the share it gets of the score is beside it.
#UniversityScoreTop 10%SpecialisationWorksGrowth
1University of CambridgeUnited Kingdom 7.610.7%7.0×9 +10.3%

Universities only. The score blends citation excellence (40%), size (30%), specialisation (10%), growth (10%), international reach (10%), 2022-now; growth compares 2018-21 with 2022-25 and counts up to +20%, since a jump from a small base is mostly noise.

Every institution in Freedom of Expression and Defamation, country by country

Is Freedom of Expression and Defamation research growing?

Output in 2022-2025 was 10% higher than in 2018-2021, peaking in 2025. The fastest-growing topics are Freedom of Expression and Defamation.

still counting19801990200020102020
grewheldshrank

The same series as a ribbon: one cell per year, darker for more. The line above answers how much; this answers when.

Its share of all research

Growing output can still be a shrinking share: all of science grows. This is Freedom of Expression and Defamation as a percentage of every work published that year, 0.0047% in 2024.

still counting0.0050%0.010%Freedom of Expression and Defamation0.0056% in 202519801990200020102020

Fractional works of Freedom of Expression and Defamation over all fractional works that year. How the balance of science has shifted.

How much of it reaches the world top 10%

Year by year.

still counting5%10%15%Freedom of Expression and Defamation10.2% in 2025200020102020

Of each year's works in it, the share that reached the world's 10% most cited for their field and year. A field is the world for its own topics, so there is no other line to hold it against.

Which topics inside it are moving

Growth and decline on one axis around a shared zero. Two lists side by side hide the thing that matters: whether the growth dwarfs the decline, or the other way round.

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