After countless people fled from war and oppression in Africa and Asia to Europe and after numerous terror attacks shocked the public, populist movements are currently gaining influence. This manifests in the success of the German right-wing party AfD, as well as in the populist campaigns that supported Great Britain’s withdrawal from the EU and…
Traditional news media are accused of being untrustworthy, public debates seem to become more polarizing and elections are faced with propaganda campaigns. Issues such like these were discussed at a workshop organized by Deutschlandradio in Berlin on Tuesday, May 15, 2017. It was entitled “public broadcasting in the age of populism” and featured an array…
Photo: grimme-akademie.de PropStop researchers Dr. Lena Frischlich, Svenja Boberg, and Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt have published an article entitled “Inhuman hate: The role of recommendation algorithms and social bots for the dissemination of cyberhate” which is featured in the recently released fourth volume of the publication series about the digital society North Rhine-Westphalia. In the…
photo: noz.de Are Europe and its democracies threatened by a wave of populism? On May 8, 2017, Prof. Dr. Thorsten Quandt (PropStop project) discussed this question at a panel discussion that was hosted by the Osnabrück-based newspaper Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung (NOZ). The event was part of the NOZ project “populism, positions, perspectives”, which was initiated…
In an expansive new study, the SZ newspaper details the contours of political Facebook use in Germany Be it via subscriptions to fanpages or likes by friends, every Facebook newsfeed is filled with political content. In light of the upcoming German federal elections, the SZ newspaper investigated the make-up of this newsfeed and whether it…
Lena Frischlich, PhD (PropStop project), has co-authered a chapter comparing right-wing extremist and islamist propaganda in the new volume „Politischer Extremismus im Vergleich“ (Comparing Political Extremism), recently published by the Lit Verlag. In “Far-right and islamist propaganda on the internet: methods, effects and prevention”, Josephine B. Schmitt, Julian Ernst, Lena Frischlich and Diana Rieger compare…
The research project PropStop presented a workshop on social bots at the FTOJ 2017 (Frankfurt Day on Online-Journalism) on April 25, 2017. Christian Grimme and Mike Preuss gave a 90-minutes talk on the potentials, threats, and future developments in the context of social bots. Additionally, they demonstrated simple ways to develop an own first social…
