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VII DemoTech International: Facing the Challenges for Democracy in the Digital Age
In the current climate of democratic recession, it becomes increasingly important for citizens to understand how authoritarianism finds strategies to undermine trust in democratic elections and rights such as freedom of expression and personal data privacy. Emerging technologies are reshaping our interactions every day and becoming increasingly “smarter” as they do so. These tools, while convenient and useful, also involve dangers and risks not always related to the intent of the actors introducing them, but to the objective of the actor who gains access to the data generated by these technologies.
Moreover, authoritarian regimes have been able to use the power of technologies to achieve their objectives of silencing dissent, dividing political opponents, controlling the population, promoting polarization and interfering in democratic processes around the world, all to achieve their goal: to advance the notion that democracy is not feasible and that authoritarianism is a viable option.
Discussion at the event will focus on three key areas:
- Illiberal influence of authoritarian regimes in Latin America: the role of emerging technologies in promoting it and what we can do to counter it.
- Russia and China’s digital influence in Latin American elections: case studies and future risks.
- Security standards to protect our democratic processes and efforts against disinformation
Panelists from around the world
The event will bring together experts from around the world in panel discussions, such as Dr. Samantha Hoffman, Australian Strategic Policy Institute, who will present findings from the NED Forum’s Democratic Resilience and Incisive Power Series; Ann Ravel, former Commissioner of the U.S. Federal Election Commission; Laura Zommer, Director of Chequeado; Fernando Pedrosa and Max Povse, Argentine political scientists from the Grupo de Estudios sobre Asia y América Latina (GESAAL) of the University of Buenos Aires; Vladimir Rouvinski and Juan Pablo Milanese, from the ICESI University of Cali (Colombia), who will present a paper on Russian electoral accompaniment and interference in Latin America; Philip Friedrich, from Freedom House, presenting the Electoral Vulnerability Index of the Elections Watch for the Digital Age program; Ignacio Ávalos, from the Venezuelan Electoral Observatory, who will speak about the report “El Sistema Patria y las Elecciones Venezolanas”; María Virginia Marín, from ProBoxVe, will present the work that reveals the manipulation of the digital conversation around the new Family Code of Cuba; and representatives from the Superior Electoral Tribunal of Brazil and the National Electoral Institute of Mexico.
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