> 1. Cultural exchange. Open networks make it easier to gain access to media that may not reflect views one grows up with. I suspect that without broad exposure

> 1. Cultural exchange. Open networks make it easier to gain access to media that may not reflect views one grows up with. I suspect that without broad exposure to different ideas/lifestyles/values, more places would trend towards nationalism. Until relatively recently, US policy and those involved in it broadly treated free access to information as something that de facto favored the US - as in, it's not that we needed to provide information as propaganda, it's that access to unfiltered information by citizens abroad intrinsically promotes the US's policy goals, in part by supporting accountability against repressive and closed regimes. It's clearly not something that's been promoted in all times and all places, but it's been a tenet of a good amount of foreign policy over time.