Democracies across Europe and the Americas are in crisis due to the rise of populism…

15+ talks

Communication, Populism, and the Crisis of Democracy Symposium | Friday, March 2, 2018

…spurred by the perceived lack of legitimacy of existing processes and institutions in the eyes of vast numbers of their citizens.

Within this context, The Politics of Contention symposium seeks to bring together scholars from Europe and America to consider populism and its relationship to contemporary communication ecology.

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Presentations

Click on image to read more & view the talk…

Lance Bennett - KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Communication and the Crisis of Democracy: Institutional Decline, Disinformation, and the Rise of the Radical Right

Pippa Norris - KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Cultural Backlash: Trump, Brexit, and the Rise of Authoritarian Populism

Dhavan Shah | Jiyoun Suk

Economic Trends, Geographic Differences, and Local News and Talk: Understanding Polarized Political Evaluations During Periods of Contention

Silvio Waisbord

Populism and Post-Truth: Time to Revisit Normative Models of Public Communication?

Frank Esser

Populism -- A Big Hit in European Political Communication Research

Jorg Matthes | + Panel Discussion

Effects of Anti-Muslim Populist Campaigns on Majority and Minority Groups: Implications for Social Cohesion

Deb Roy

Listening Technologies for Understanding Public Opinion

Chris Wells

The Social Geography of Contentious Politics and its Linguistic Markers

Talia Stroud

Partisan Polarization and the News Media

Daniel Kreiss | + Panel Discussion

Identity, Communication, and Democracy: Tracing Contentious Politics Across Contexts and Mediums

Sheri Berman

Declining democratic responsiveness and linkage in the US and Europe

Karolina Koc-Michalska

Populism and Facebook: 14 countries, 117 parties and 2014 EP election campaign

Sven Engesser

Authoritarianism, Populists and the Media: An Integrative Theoretical Model

Julia Azari | + Panel Discussion

The Political Geography of Presidential Populism

We had two questions in mind…

(1) How has growing polarization and fragmentation in the media ecology, as reflected in partisan media, broadcast content, political advertising and social media, contributed to ideological and partisan political divides?

(2) Under what conditions does the flow of information in the media ecology encourage citizens across the ideological spectrum to retrench into increasingly homogeneous sub- clusters that amplify highly partisan messages of party leaders and political pundits?

A word from participants
at the #cpcd event…

  • This conference was among the first to bring together leading international scholars in communication, political science, sociology, and history to address the role changing digital media systems play in driving the global wave of populism.

    HERNANDO ROJAS - Professor of Journalism and Mass Communication
  • If ever there was a time we needed to better understand the impacts of populist communications, this is it, and this conference felt like an important part of that journey.

    CERI HUGHES - Grad Student
  • The really interesting thing about your study is what kind of polarization is taking place between these different kinds of [groups] and how can we measure it?

    SVEN ENGESSER - PROFESSOR OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY COMMUNICATION AT TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITÄT DRESDEN, GERMANY
  • One of the great strengths you have in your data, which you possibly didn’t highlight enough – is the whole dynamic nature…

    JÖRG MATTHES - PROFESSOR & CHAIR OF THE DEPT OF COMMUNICATION, UNIVERSITY OF VIENNA, AUSTRIA