Can The Democracy Survive The Internet?: Lessons From 2016

WAMU 88.5

Published June 6, 2017 at 11:06 AM EDT

TOPSHOT - This April 10, 2016 photo taken in Washington before the outcome of the 2016 U.S. presidential election shows a woman reading an online version of a mockup of what a frontpage might look like if Donald Trump were declared the winner.

Divisive discourse. Trump’s tweets. “Fake news.”

The 2016 Election revealed the surprising ways the internet can shape Americans’ political views. Voters were exposed to strategically placed misinformation, propaganda posts composed by automated programs and an increased volume on hate speech and hostile political rhetoric.

Stanford law professor Nate Persily has written about this phenomenon in a journal article called “Can Democracy Survive The Internet?”

If what we saw in 2016 was just the beginning, what can we expect the next national election to be like? With all the political noise the internet is generating, can true democracy still be heard?

GUESTS

Nate Persily, James B. McClatchy professor of law, Stanford University

Zeynep Tufekci, Author, “Twitter and Tear Gas: The Power and Fragility of Networked Protest”; associate professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Information and Library Science; faculty associate at the Harvard Berkman Klein Center

Wael Ghonim, Internet activist

Aaron Sharockman, Executive director, Politifact

For more, visit http://the1a.org.