Date: June 29th 2026
Time: 12:00-13:00 CEST
Location: Online event
The next EDMO BELUX Lunch Lecture will take place on June 29th, 2026, at 12:00-13:00 CEST. Join them for the webinar, where Professor Stephan Lewandowsky will present his perspectives on the problematic relationship between the Internet, especially the engagement-based business model of social media platforms, and democracy.
Attendance is free but registration is required: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/63521a2f-32ee-46ce-b12a-798a0e40c595@7ab090d4-fa2e-4ecf-bc7c-4127b4d582ec
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Several scholars have opined that the Internet, especially the engagement-based business model of social media platforms, is incompatible with democracy. The term “surveillance capitalism” has been used to describe this business model. However, to date there has been no systematic examination of the evidence for those claims. Professor Stephan Lewandowsky reviews the evidence we now have to support the assertion that the Internet, in its current form, is antithetical to democracy.
His approach rests in part on the material recently published in a report for the European Commission, entitled Fractured Realities. The core argument rests on a causal chain from network homophily to false-consensus effects to populist attitudes. Specifically, it is known that people connect preferentially to others online who share their interests and views, thus creating interconnected communities that provide epistemic support even for extreme or outlandish views that are shared by few people. The consequence is that people experience a false consensus, that is they think that everybody shares their view—when in fact they are part of a very small community. One consequence of being trapped in a false consensus is that people will likely feel ignored by politicians because governments are more likely to implement policies that are favoured by an actual majority of the public, not the perceived false consensus of fringe communities. In consequence, people who are trapped in a false consensus are more likely to feel ignored and develop “anti-elitist” views, and thus are more likely to support populist and antidemocratic parties.
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Professor Stephan Lewandowsky is a cognitive scientist at the University of Bristol whose research centers on the tension between online architectures and democracy. He has published hundreds of peer-reviewed articles and is currently funded by the European Research Council and by the EU’s Horizon 2020 programme.