Acharya and Buzan's (2019) GIS 1.2 predictions suggest a change in the power dynamics between core and periphery countries where there will be a wide diffusion of wealth, power, and cultural influences. The GIS 1.2 also evidences shifting global dynamics where global capitalistic issues exist in different ideological settings. The authors predict rapid technological advancements that support nation-state activities. Non-nation-state data scientists and data platforms influence domestic and international behavior. Similarly, Slaughter's description of web networks suggests that intentional, organic, and uncivil actors participate in international relations alongside chessboards. She suggests these technological advances facilitate network actions, thereby empowering communications among participants, yet subject to the interests of data platform structures.

The first three chapters respond to the initial question this volume raises. Brevard's comparative analysis, specifically, looking at the right to privacy in the People's Republic of China and the United States, was able to show parallels between China's overt desire to track movement, actions, and decisions of its citizens, to the United States’ covert practices through the Patriot Act to do the same. She aimed to show the similarities between the People's Republic of China and the United States, notably regarding information technology and surveillance. Since both export their technologies and use device data mining in Big Data, Brevard argues that the United States may be leaning toward the Peoples Republic of China's authoritarian tendencies. Acharya and Buzan indicate that in GIS 1.2, nation-state actions in scientific knowledge and technology will be influenced by uncertainty, in that the trajectory and contours of the Internet are undetermined. This uncertainty has significant implications for inclusionism given its specific individual/community orientation as well as technology's insidious and pervasive influence in the lives of more and more people across the world. The PRC–US relationship at the apex of global international society 1.2 is increasingly subject to forces that are well beyond the scope of nation-state influence with considerable implications for agency as this pertains to the daily lives of their respective populations.

Ehmke's chapter focuses on regulating online disinformation, that is, fake news, as her analysis questions the greater risk to democracy: fake news or the measures to control the flow of information.