In the absence of regulation, we are ultimately at the mercy of social media platforms and their algorithms. This week, host Elisa welcomes Joshua Tucker, Professor of Politics at NYU, to discuss his extensive research on American elections, including voter influence through social media and how broad public opinions are formed on and off these platforms. How do you go about accessing this kind of data from platforms like Twitter, Facebook and TikTok? Does Youtube's algorithm push people towards extreme content? And how can we better regulate TikTok in particular, a Chinese controlled platform that's gained huge popularity in the U.S.?

Joshua Tucker is Professor of Politics at New York University, Director of the Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia, Co-Director NYU Center for Social Media and Politics(CSMaP):

https://as.nyu.edu/faculty/joshua-tucker.html

References:

NSLT Ep. 213, "Putin's State of Mind with Robert Dannenberg (Part 1). March 10, 2022:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/national-security-law-today/id1276946676?i=1000553603393

Persily, Nathaniel, and Joshua A. Tucker, editors. Social Media and Democracy: The State of the Field, Prospects for Reform. Cambridge University Press, 2020:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/social-media-and-democracy/E79E2BBF03C18C3A56A5CC393698F117

Prior, Markus. Post-Broadcast Democracy: How Media Choice Increases Inequality in Political Involvement and Polarizes Elections. Cambridge University Press, 2010:

https://www.booksamillion.com/p/Post-Broadcast-Democracy/Markus-Prior/9780521675338?id=8044355996728

Guriev, S. M., and Daniel Treisman. Spin Dictators: The Changing Face of Tyranny in the 21st Century. Princeton University Press, 2022:

https://press.princeton.edu/books/hardcover/9780691211411/spin-dictators

Eady, G., Paskhalis, T., Zilinsky, J. et al. Exposure to the Russian Internet Research Agency foreign influence campaign on Twitter in the 2016 US election and its relationship to attitudes and voting behavior. Nat Commun 14, 62 (2023):

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-35576-9

For a full list of Joshua Tucker's recent research, articles and book references:

https://wp.nyu.edu/fas-joshuatucker/research/