The Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society’s (HIIG) event series “Digitaler Salon” will focus on the change in our conversational climate, what social media might have to do with it, and how we can protect ourselves from tipping the point of democratic opinion-forming.
Prof. Dr. Matthias C. Kettemann will introduce the topic.
The discussion will be between:
- Prof. Dr. Jeanette Hofmann, Research and Founding Director of the HIIG
- Dr. Johannes Gemkow, Research Institute Social Cohesion (RISC), Leipzig
Moderator: Katja Weber, radioeins/rbb, Deutschlandfunk Nova
The event on “Wie viel Internet verträgt unsere Demokratie?” [How Much Internet Can Our Democracy Tolerate?] will be held in German.
About the Event
Headlines and commentaries in online media seem to prove those right who assume an increasing polarization of the public – in line with the latest election results in the US and Germany. But is “the internet” really to blame? Is it “social media” or “digitalization” that endangers our democracy? There are no simple answers – opinion-forming processes are too complex: life in modern societies has many layers, political action has many reasons. And yet we know a lot about the impact of social media and the effects of digital discussion spaces on social discourse. There is no shortage of proposed solutions. A mix of regulation, effective implementation, as well as diversity and media education in the promotion of democratic communication channels seems promising. But can we use it to lower the temperature in hot discussions and make debates more objective?
This Digitale Salon is taking place as part of the research project DSA Research Network and in the context the report “Information Ecosystems and Troubled Democracy – A Global Synthesis of the State of Knowledge on News Media, AI and Data Governance” by the Forum on Information & Democracy.
