Nation as Network is an ethnographic foray into the political and cultural influence of digital media on Eritrea as a nation, from the perspective of sovereignty and citizenship, and through the study of selected websites. Bernal's argument is founded on the premise that the internet is not first and foremost a science and technology product; rather, it is a cultural medium – one that is central to the production of social texts and cultural artefacts. Based on this premise, she has two fundamental arguments. Firstly, digital media provide citizens with resources to ‘participate in’ and ‘co-author’ the ‘narratives that govern their lives', informing their political struggles and extending the boundaries of what is widely regarded as citizenship. The second argument is that, although one may not be able to generalize about whether the impact of digital media in promoting ‘nation as network’ is strengthening or weakening national sovereignty, it remains clear that ‘states continue to remain significant and powerful’ even in the midst of ‘global flows' and ‘transnational connections'.

In this book, Bernal clearly structures her analysis of Eritrean life online along three major poles: namely, politics, media and diaspora. This approach is helpful to the reader because the connections between the three strands in the formation of nation as a network become clearer. Bernal weaves her narrative through Eritrea's tumultuous political history and practices, and through the uptake of the internet (new media) by the diaspora and the contribution to Eritrea's politics through communicative action on websites. This in turn reveals how the dominant understanding of citizenship and sovereignty is being challenged, and even ‘reconfigured’ and ‘reproduced’ through the internet. In Bernal's words, the internet is allowing ‘the creation of an elastic political space’, ‘which extends and at the same time exhibits the limits to territorial sovereignty’.

The role of digital media in politics across societies from the global South to the West has been a prominent subject of academic discourse since the increased adoption of digital media tools that led to significant events such as the Arab Spring, Obama's election in the US and the Occupy movements, to mention just a few prominent examples. Many scholars have raised enquiries about the implications of growing access to the internet and digital media generally with regard to (global) politics. Books such as Manuel Castells's Networks of Outrage and Hope: social movements in the internet age, James E. Katz et al.'s The Social Media President: Barack Obama and the politics of digital engagement and others have alternated their focus between the activities of the state and the display of mass action by the citizenry when interrogating the political implications of new digital media. In this book, however, Bernal's contribution to knowledge first and foremost focuses on a part of the globe not well represented in scholarly discourse: Eritrea – a place she describes as ‘a small nation in the horn of Africa’. In addition, despite asking questions that are similar to those that digital media scholars often ask, such as who is using digital media, how are they using it, and with what implications, Bernal's ethnographic approach reveals significant findings that further extend the discussion. Hence, although many studies have addressed the political impact of digital media on societies from the position of social movements, revolutions, protests and other forms of mass action, Bernal's Eritrean study takes time to examine the ways of a people, revealing the more gradual cultural shift brought about by the adoption of ICT.

Although the theoretical grounding of the book is not explicitly stated, the use of key terms such as the ‘public sphere’ and ‘debates' and references to Habermas show that Bernal is somewhat inclined to his theory. Yet the theorizing of the public sphere does not form her main frame of reference. Bernal focuses more on developing her own conceptual framework, which she appears to find more relevant and useful in contextualizing her discussion of the Eritrean online public space. In doing this, she develops two major concepts: infopolitics or infopolitical power and sacrificial citizenship. Infopolitics refers to how power is exercised and expressed through the control of media, communication, circulation and actions of censorship and authorization. To Bernal, ‘power relations are embedded in the circulation of management of information’. Sacrificial citizenship, on the other hand, is a concept that characterizes the ‘social contract between citizens and the state’, which, according to Bernal, in Eritrea is displayed through ‘sacrificing for the nation’.

Scholars of media, politics, sociology and African studies, and those interested in the emerging research method of digital ethnography, will find this book immensely useful. In the same vein, active citizens who seek to further understand how their participation in the affairs of their respective states can have varied impacts would also find this book a constructive resource. One shortcoming of the book might be the lack of any mention of other sites in cyberspace where an Eritrean communicative public sphere might have been reconstituted, such as social networking sites. In addition, other questions arising would include whether images were part of the social texts on these websites and what meanings they bore. But, notwithstanding these shortcomings, the overall understanding one may glean from this book is that the roles new media can play are not divided strictly along the binary lines of being ‘net deluded’ or ‘net smart’. Rather, these roles are shaped by the cultural actions of the users for whom digital media serve as a platform for ‘collective social practices, public communication and collaboration’.