Monika Gill

Monika Gill is a Doctoral Researcher, based in the King’s Centre for Strategic Communications (KCSC) at King’s College London. Her research explores the nature of influence in Georgia, and specifically, the emergence of alternative networks of influence. 

Monika’s research lies at the intersection of three fields of enquiry: Strategic Communications, influence, and networks. Framing a conversation between these concepts, the research builds a model of how social movement organisations develop alternative networks of influence in contested environments.

Monika currently guest lectures at the Georgian Institute of Public Affairs (GIPA). She previously worked for the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence in Riga, Latvia, prior to which she completed her MA in Intelligence and International Security at King’s College. Owing to a firm interest in Strategic Communications, she has published research on the strategic reliance of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps on the Iranian communications economy. Monika holds a BA (Hons) in International Relations from the University of Durham, with a year spent at the University of Hong Kong.

At King’s College London, Monika is PGR rep for the research theme, ‘Society, Culture and Law’.

 Research Interests

• Strategic Communications
• Influence
• Social movement organisations
• Networks of influence
• Dominant and alternative networks of influence in Georgia and the South Caucasus
• Media and telecommunications infrastructure ownership and the case of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps

Publications

Gill, Monika, ‘Capitalism, Communications, and the Corps: Iran’s Revolutionary Guard and the Communications Economy’, Defence Strategic Communications 9 (2021): 87-120.

Gill, Monika, & Dan Zafrir, ‘Comment, Share, Report: Cyber Interference as a Violation of International Law’ in Leonie Haiden (Ed.) The Future is Now, (Riga, Latvia: NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence & London, England: King’s Centre for Strategic Communications, 2021)

Heap, Ben, Monika Gill, & Pia Hansen, Strategic Communications Hybrid Threats Toolkit: Applying the principles of NATO Strategic Communications to understand and counter grey zone threats, (Riga, Latvia: NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, 2021) 

Thesis

What is the nature of influence in Georgia and to what extent are social movement organisations able to develop alternative networks of influence in Georgia’s hybrid democracy?  

Supervisors

Dr Neville Bolt (primary)

Dr Ofer Fridman (second)