Democracy is built on trust—and accountability. Citizens need information to hold those in power to account. But disinformation is eroding our trust in institutions, in experts, and even in our fellow citizens.

In the first episode of Talking Policy’s new miniseries, Democracy and Its Discontents, host Lindsay Shingler talks with Simone Chambers, a professor of political science at UC Irvine, about what disinformation is, and how it’s impacting voter trust—both in elections and in the institution of democracy itself. Chambers is the author of Wrecking the Public Sphere: The New Authoritarians’ Digital Attack on Pluralism and Truth (with Jeff Kopstein) and the new book Contemporary Democratic Theory.