I was glad to participate in this panel:

How does social media impact democracy? Social media platforms perform a valuable public forum function. They can unite people, generate social empathy, mobilize political action, amplify important issues and voices that might be excluded from traditional media, help check government abuse, and provide access to information from around the world. At the same time, critics contend that social media platforms deepen social and political divisions, support the rapid spread of harmful misinformation and disinformation, allow like-minded people to organize for political violence, and erode trust in the democratic process. Considering growing concerns that social media platforms can no longer be left to self-regulate, calls for government intervention into platform governance have grown exponentially louder around the world. This panel will discuss some of the proposed reforms, global implications of any approach we adopt, and how next generation technologies may address negative impacts of past and current social media.

Speakers:

Mary-Rose Papandrea, Samuel Ashe Distinguished Professor of Constitutional Law, University of North Carolina School of Law, Leader UNC’s Democracy Initiative; Moderator

Eric Goldman, Associate Dean for Research and Professor, Santa Clara University School of Law and Co-Director, High Tech Law Institute & Supervisor, Privacy Law Certificate

Paul S. Grewal, Chief Legal Officer, Coinbase

Neema Singh Guliani, Head of National Security, Democracy, and Civil Rights Public Policy, Twitter

Richard L. Hasen, Chancellor’s Professor of Law and Political Science, University of California, Irvine School of Law

Jameel Jaffer, Executive Director, Knight First Amendment Institute, Columbia University

2022 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference

Recorded: July 21, 2022