In today’s media environment, a fringe rumor can rapidly become a national headline—or even lead to the dismantling of a government agency. Social media has transformed democratic politics by enabling influence to flow through a system of influencers, algorithms, and online crowds. The result isn’t just faster communication—it’s a fundamental reordering of how attention, legitimacy, and authority operate.

This AISSR Lecture traces three interlocking shifts:

First, the rewiring of legitimacy, as credibility flows to those who perform authority online.

Second, the rewarding of extremity, creating evolutionary pressure toward outrage, polarization, and even the intimidation of public servants.

And third, consensus reality fragments, as viral narratives replace shared facts with bespoke informational worlds. These changes don't just shape discourse—they shape outcomes. Understanding this new architecture of influence is essential for grasping how narratives move, how power now operates, and how institutions must respond in a participatory media ecosystem.

Aftertalk

After her lecture, Renee will discuss her ideas with Ulrike Klinger (Political Communication & Journalism) and Liza Mügge (AISSR, Political Science).

Drinks 

Afterwards, there will be time to chat and ask questions over drinks and snacks in De Brug, from 17:00 to 18:00.

About Renee DiResta

Renée DiResta is a social media researcher and author of Invisible Rulers: The People Who Turn Lies into Reality. An Associate Research Professor at Georgetown University’s McCourt School of Public Policy, she studies how information systems are manipulated and how they can be redesigned to enhance user agency through middleware, decentralized governance, and other innovations.

Formerly the technical research manager at the Stanford Internet Observatory (2019–2024), her work has long focused on online adversarial abuse—from state-sponsored influence operations to spam networks and child safety threats. She advises government and industry leaders on issues spanning information operations, generative AI, election security, and decentralized identity. At the request of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, she led research into the Russia-linked Internet Research Agency and GRU influence campaigns during the 2016 election.

Her writing appears in The Atlantic, Lawfare, Wired, Noema, Foreign Affairs, CJR, The New York Times, Washington Post, Yale Review, The Guardian, POLITICO, and Slate. She has been a Presidential Leadership Scholar, Emerson Fellow, Truman Project fellow, Mozilla Fellow, Harvard Berkman-Klein affiliate, and CFR term member.

This lecture is organized in collaboration with The John Adams Institute