Wonks and War Rooms

In this episode, Elizabeth talks to Mike Pal , a law professor at the University of Ottawa , about election laws in Canada. Elizabeth and Mike discuss the laws and institutions that govern elections in Canada, including the Canada Elections Act and Elections Canada .   They discuss threats to election integrity and security posed by new technologies in an age of democratic decline. Elizabeth and M...

In this episode, Elizabeth talks to Nick Taylor-Vaisey , a journalist for Politico who works on the Ottawa Playbook , a free daily morning newsletter decoding Canadian politics. Nick and Elizabeth discuss the role of newsletters in curating information in a high-choice media environment and the way journalism has adapted to becoming digital. They discuss newsletters as a form of political informat...

In this episode, Elizabeth is joined by Conner Coles , a former lobbyist with experience working in and around politics, including during the political party candidate nomination process. Conner walks us through the issue of foreign interference in nomination races , how a lack of federal oversight in these contests exacerbates the problem, and the impact this can have on our democratic systems. C...

In this episode, Elizabeth interviews Brazilian journalist and columnist Patrícia Campos Mello , who first exposed the illegal use of WhatsApp mass messaging in Brazil's 2018 presidential elections. Together, they examine how politically motivated groups orchestrate fake grassroots movements—known as astroturfing—to manipulate public opinion and influence media coverage. Patrícia shares Brazi...

In this episode, Elizabeth Dubois chats with Melanie Paradis , President of Texture Communications , to dissect the theory of planned behaviour and its application in political communication. With Melanie’s extensive background in political strategy and public relations, and her roles on high-profile political campaigns, this discussion explores how psychological principles underpin effective poli...

Wonks and War Rooms is kicking off season 7 with all things elections! With 73 elections worldwide, 2024 is being called a “global elections supercycle”.  Elizabeth introduces the headlining topics listeners can get excited to learn about this season, including the theory of planned behaviour, astroturfing, foreign interference at the nomination level, and election laws. Elizabeth also talks about...

This week Elizabeth talks with Seher Shafiq , a program manager at the Mozilla Foundation and expert in civic engagement, particularly in the context of elections and engaging marginalized people in the vote. They discuss how AI is impacting Canadian elections, civic engagement, and democracy. They look at helpful and not so helpful uses of AI tools in elections and chat about ways these tools cou...

In this episode Elizabeth discusses the idea of counter-speech as content moderation with far right extremist researcher, Kesa White . Kesa describes her work on “dog-whistling,” talks about how counter speech can be helpful but doesn’t solve the problem of hate speech online, and explains some of the challenges tech companies face with content moderation. Drawing on her own experience with hate-s...

This week Elizabeth talks with Michael Redhead Champagne , a community organizer in Winnipeg working to dismantle harmful systems and build better ones through Indigenous practices and knowledge. They discuss collective and connective action logics, and the importance of creating networks of people to promote and sustain change. Michael talks about building a spider web or network to help advance...

In this episode Elizabeth chats with TikTok creator and researcher T.X. Watson about parasocial relationships and how this term created in the 1950s applies, or not, to digital content creators. T.X. talks about relationships between influencers and their followers and how both research and popular culture still don't have words to properly describe this new form of connection. They discuss i...

In this episode Elizabeth delves into the fascinating world of data and personalization with Hamish Marshall , former National Campaign Manager for the Conservative Party of Canada and seasoned expert at the crossroads of data and politics. They explore the evolution from the Two-Step Flow to the One-Step Flow of Communication, examining how data personalization and the changing media landscape ha...

In this episode, Elizabeth chats with digital communication strategist and experienced political campaigner, Nate Lubin about social media content creators in politics. Nate draws on his experience with the Better Internet Initiative which helps influencers make educational content related to progressive issues as well as his past experience as Director of the Office of Digital Strategy at the Whi...

In this episode Elizabeth chats with journalist Rachel Gilmore about what counts as journalistic content and how to navigate the intersection of journalism and the social media influencer industry. Rachel is a freelance journalist who posts regularly on TikTok (@rachel_gilmore ), Instagram (@r.gilmore ), and X (@atRachelGilmore) having previously worked in organizations such as CTV and Global News...

This week Elizabeth chats with Dave Sommer , Vice President of Strategic Communication at Enterprise Canada , former Head of Politics and Government at Instagram in Washington, D.C., and former Deputy Director of Communications, Digital, for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Ottawa. They chat about the use of social media in political campaigning, where personal influence fits in, and how it has ev...

This week Elizabeth chats with tech culture reporter and Washington Post columnist, Taylor Lorenz about influencers and the influencer industry. Taylor takes us from Ce-web-reties to influencers to content creators, telling us a bit about the history of folks who monetize their online presence. The two chat about the influencer industry beyond social media influencer marketing, the unique dynamics...

Prepare for an intriguing journey in Season 6 of Wonks & War Rooms! Join Elizabeth Dubois as she unravels the dynamics of personal influence in politics, especially as it evolves with new technologies. In this episode Elizabeth talks about her experience working in politics and how it has pushed her to question what counts as personal influence and what roles technology plays in political comm...

Get ready for Season 6 of Wonks & War Rooms! This season, we're looking at personal influence in politics and how it evolves as new technologies are integrated into campaign strategies. Host Elizabeth Dubois will talk to journalists, campaigners, content creators, activists and more to discuss everything from opinion leaders to social media influencers to personalization and augmented ana...

In this final episode, our host Elizabeth reflects on the six episodes of Season 5, which dug into tech, politics, and policy with guests from the Berkman Klein Centre at Harvard and Center for Information Technology and Public Life (CITAP) at UNC-Chapel Hill. She recaps highlights of each episode, looks at what they had in common, and where we need to dig a little deeper. Additional resources: He...

Matt Perault is the director of the Center on Technology Policy at UNC Chapel Hill , and previously worked at Facebook, as the head of the global policy development team. This episode he and Elizabeth get into the weeds on antitrust competition laws, monopolies and big tech. They talk about how monopolies can be both good and bad, the goals of antitrust laws, and the complication of these laws app...

In this special episode Elizabeth is joined by our panel of experts — Samantha Bradshaw , Wendy Chun , Suzie Dunn , Fenwick McKelvey and Wendy H. Wong —  for a roundtable discussion on how artificial intelligence is being deployed in Canadian political contexts. The topics range from mis- and disinformation, facial recognition, synthetic media, deep fakes and voice cloning to technical terms like...

Get ready for a special live edition of Wonks and War Rooms! From deep fakes to detecting disinformation or harassment to voting predictions and sentiment analysis, AI-enabled technologies are playing an increasing role in democratic election processes. Join us on April 3 at 12 p.m. ET for a roundtable discussion on the use of artificial intelligence in politics. Our host Elizabeth Dubois, and a p...

Becca Rinkevic is the Director of the Institute for Rebooting Social Media and formerly the Deputy Director of Digital Strategy at the White House under President Joe Biden. This week she and Elizabeth are tackling the role of big tech in election campaigns and political advertising. They talk about the involvement of representatives from social media companies in election advertising campaigns, t...

Julie Owono is the executive director of Internet Sans Frontières (Internet Without Borders) and a fellow at the Berkman Klein Center at Harvard University. She is also an inaugural member of the Meta Oversight Board , an independent group of experts who review appeals of content moderation decisions on Facebook and Instagram, which is the topic of today’s episode.  Elizabeth and Julie talk about...

Juliana Castro-Varón is the founder of the digital open access publisher Cita Press , and a fellow at the Berkman Klein Center at Harvard University. This episode she and Elizabeth discuss the historical examples of image manipulation, how photographic manipulations can mislead the public and the impact of images on our memories. They also talk about ways to spot fakes. Additional resources Early...

Petra Molnar is a lawyer and anthropologist, and co-director of York University’s Refugee Law Lab . This episode she and Elizabeth talk about how researchers get their expertise into the hands of people who shape the world we live in, like policymakers, politicians and journalists. They talk about what it means to know something, as well as different approaches to sharing knowledge, like co-produc...