Reflexive Democracy
We interrogate the changing role of information and communication in democratic society at a time of shifting consensus on liberal democracy.
Professor Shakuntala Banaji writes and speaks about social media hate and disinformation, particularly in the world’s largest democracy, India.
Professor Bart Cammaerts and Dr Nick Anstead analyze deepfake propaganda circulating on social media in a range of Western democracies which held elections last year (2024).
Dr Pablo Morales examines China’s international communication strategy in Latin America, particularly in relation to the implications for journalism and the public sphere in the region.
Dr Wendy Willems rethinks the public sphere and the canonical work of Jürgen Habermas in the context of slavery and the slave trade.
Professor Charlie Beckett looks at the role of journalism in the information ecosystem, especially related to new technologies such as AI and debates around political communication and misinformation.
Professor Nick Couldry researches the impact of the space of commercial social media platforms on the possibility of human solidarity, and therefore any viable democratic politics, and also the contribution that federated social media may make to this problem.
Dr Nick Anstead is working on the changing temporalities of electoral democracy in an age of political populism and democratic instability.
Dr César Jiménez-Martínez is working on examining the mediated visibility of protests and unrest in the UK and Latin America in the context of increasing criminalisation of dissent.
Professor Lee Edwards researches the role and impact of the promotional industries and promotional culture on inequalities and the quality of public life.
Disruptive Knowledge Generation
We use participatory, collaborative methodologies to innovate ways of defining problems, gathering evidence, and sharing knowledge, including with and for members of systematically disadvantaged groups.
Professor Myria Georgiou focuses on refugees, migrants, and digital connectivity and investigates how technology and power are shaping the new social order emerging within cities.
Professor Ellen Helsper develops frameworks for evidence-based evaluative research of media literacy and digital skills, in relation to social inequalities.
Dr Seeta Peña Gangadharan uses collaborative research methods to examine the impacts of data-driven, algorithmic, and AI-powered systems, including surveillance and police technologies, on the lives of marginalized people in the United States and Europe.
Dr Seeta Peña Gangadharan examines legal and policy developments in the United States that have helped to super-charge Amazon’s ability to use managerial surveillance to shift risks to workers, their communities, state institutions, and society.
Dr Alison Powell researches technology policy and civic action, foregrounding participation, creativity and engaged research in order to make policy processes more relevant and legitimate.
Professor Charlie Beckett uses active participant engagement through the JournalismAI project to create research with practitioners that includes innovation, education and training.
Professor Ellen Helsper and Professor Bart Cammaerts lead on RIGAN: Resisting Inequalities through a Global Arts Network, supporting the development of an international network of community organisations in India, Kenya and UK who use art to challenge structures of inequalities in their local contexts.
Professor Nick Couldry researches the emerging social contract around AI and its implications for how we value human reflexivity in various work and cultural contexts.
Dr Dylan Mulvin researches the intersection of disability and technology and how disability activists have campaigned for access to media technology in times of crisis.