Digital Technology for Democracy Lab

The University of Virginia is poised to take the lead in addressing a major global challenge: ensuring that rapidly evolving digital technologies fortify, rather than undermine, democratic institutions and practices. The University can bring together research and practice in innovative ways that create collaboration and exchange between academia, policy makers, and the technology industry. Building on existing but still-too-fragmented strengths at UVA, this proposed investment will promote the project of crafting digital technology for democracy.  

UVA will pursue this goal through the following two initiatives:  

A Technology & Democracy Fellows program that will support postdoctoral fellowships. This transdisciplinary, University-wide investment will bring the best emerging researchers working at the intersection of fields to UVA, helping to train a critical mass of the next generation of scholars and leaders while serving to connect and accelerate faculty research. 

Six fellows have been recruited to come to UVA starting in the fall of 2024 and will be in residence for two years, each of them working with one or two faculty mentors in different areas. Another class of fellows will be recruited next year. Their presence will be a catalyzing force for faculty conversations and collaborations across often-disconnected areas of the University. The fellows themselves will also come together as a cohort on a regular basis for training, to share their research, and to build community. Combined with UVA's programming and residencies for more senior researchers and practitioners, this program will also serve as a connector and accelerant for interdisciplinary exchange and research across Grounds.

A Technology and Democracy Exchange will bring practitioners in the technology industries and government/policy spheres together with academic researchers for intensive exchange and collaborative work. The goal of this conversation and consultation between different leadership and practice sectors will be to help envision and design an ecosystem in which digital technologies sustain democracy. 

The first program in the exchange is a series of dinners for congressional staffers, hosted in collaboration with the Kluge Center at the Library of Congress and developed by Aynne Kokas, a faculty co-lead of the Digital Technology for Democracy Lab. Kokas, the C. K. Yen Professor at the Miller Center and an associate professor of media studies, has gathered together scholars and practitioners to speak to key issues staffers should consider in crafting legislation relating to digital technology, include artificial intelligence. In the fall of 2024, other faculty leads will host workshops on the use of AI in city governance and on the impacts of AI visual deep-fakes on political campaigns globally. A series of public virtual events organized by faculty co-lead Mona Sloane focusing on AI's impact, including one on campaigns, were held and will continue next year.

The successful harnessing of digital technology in support of democracy is one of the most pivotal projects of our time and has the potential to change the cultural and political dynamics in societies around the globe. UVA can and should play a creative and courageous role in this project. In so doing, the University will be fulfilling and sustaining its core mission, while also demonstrating the critical role universities have in fortifying and nourishing the future of democracy.

“We are delighted that our proposal was selected for support from the Grand Challenges Research Initiatives and believe UVA can play an important role in shaping conversation and action around the problems and possibilities of digital technology for the future of democracy,” said Dubois. “Our University has tremendous strengths in this area that we seek to catalyze, and our proximity and connections to Washington, D.C., will give us an opportunity to shape policy discussions on this topic.” 

The Karsh Institute is now developing the Technology & Democracy Fellows program, which will welcome the first cohort in the fall of 2024. Planning for additional programs is also underway.