June 26-27, 2024

Queensland University in Brisbane, Australia

Deadline: February 1, 2024

Organisers: Axel Bruns, Jessica Walter, Daniel Kreiss and Anja Bechmann

Funding: Prof. Bruns’s Australian Laureate Fellowship project, The Independent Research Fund Denmark, and the European Digital Media Observatory.

Please submit your 500 word abstract at: https://lnkd.in/dPmpF5Hi

Event Information

In recent years, scholars around the globe have increasingly sounded alarms about the threats to democracy posed by media and technological change. Researchers have analysed the relationship between mis- and disinformation, political and state propaganda, the growth of a new class of social and political influencers, and deepening partisanship, growing populism, and increasing polarisation. 

Despite the insights this work has already generated, the relationship between media, propaganda, mis/disinformation, and polarisation and power is either not well understood or conceptual models are subfield-specific. However, it is increasingly clear that political actors and movements wield media, propaganda, and mis/disinformation in pursuit of social, political, economic, or cultural power. Polarisation is often a tool in the service of people pursuing power, or the inevitable by-product of struggles over power. 

This two-day postconference brings together current and emerging conceptual and applied theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of the relationship between power, propaganda, and polarisation. Day One reviews and challenges our conceptual frameworks for understanding the relationship between power and patterns of information and social interaction, while Day Two takes stock of the current methodological toolkit for the study of power, propaganda, and polarisation.

We invite your paper contributions on these issues. Abstracts of up to 3500 characters (plus references) are due by 1 February 2024.

The postconference will centrally address the dynamics of our destabilising contemporary social media and platform landscape – affected by the slow decline of Facebook, the rapid disintegration of Twitter, and the swift rise of algorithmic-driven platforms such as TikTok. These have created a complex digital environment of partially intersecting publics whose flows of information, discourse, and influence are as yet difficult to trace, analyse, and conceptualise both qualitatively and computationally.

Both days will feature keynotes by eminent scholars in the field, with particular attention paid to the diversity of perspectives and backgrounds represented by keynote and paper presenters. The organising team represents leading research institutions across three continents, and is committed to ensuring a broad geographical representation of participants.

The P³ postconference is supported by the Digital Media Research Centre at Queensland University of Technology, the DATALAB – Center for Digital Social Research at Aarhus University, and the Center for Information, Technology, and Public Life at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; it is held at the Kelvin Grove campus of Queensland University of Technology in central Brisbane, Australia. Funding for the postconference is provided by Prof. Bruns’s Australian Laureate Fellowship project, the Independent Research Fund Denmark, and the European Digital Media Observatory.

Submission Instructions

Please complete the fields below and upload a paper abstract of no more than 500 words in Word or PDF format by 1 February 2024. 

We will endeavour to inform you of the outcomes of the selection process by 1 March 2024. 

By completing this form, you consent to be contacted by us with follow-up information. We will directly contact only the submitting authors.

The postconference will charge a modest registration fee of US$50 for faculty, and US$25 for students. This supports the event coordination and catering costs.

This will be an in-person event only – unfortunately we will not be able to accommodate remote presentations or attendance.