The Cyber Policy Center is part of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies.
The Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) at Stanford University is pleased to announce that Jennifer Pan has been appointed to the position of FSI Senior Fellow, effective September 1. The appointment is concurrent with her promotion to professor at Stanford’s Department of Communication.
At FSI, Pan will work primarily within the Center on China’s Economy and Institutions (SCCEI) and will also be affiliated with the Cyber Policy Center. Her research focuses on political communication and authoritarian politics. She uses experimental and computational methods with large-scale datasets on political activity in China and other authoritarian regimes to answer questions about how autocrats perpetuate their rule; how political censorship, propaganda, and information manipulation work in the digital age; and how peoples’ preferences and behaviors are shaped as a result.
"Jennifer is both a top expert in political communication and authoritarian politics and an outstanding teacher," said FSI Director Michael McFaul. "I’m eager to see how her groundbreaking approach will influence research across the institute and inspire our students in the classroom."
Scott Rozelle, co-director of SCCEI, added: "Jennifer is at the forefront of research in her field, conducting groundbreaking empirical research that uses the unique lens of communication to build understanding of China’s economy and its impact on the world. In the past year alone, Jennifer gave several lectures to our SCCEI community, all of which drew large audiences and sparked lively discussion. We are thrilled to have her officially join our team and I can’t wait to see where her research takes her next."
Pan’s book, “Welfare for Autocrats: How Social Assistance in China Cares for its Rulers,” shows how China’s pursuit of political order transformed the country’s main social assistance program, Dibao, for repressive purposes. Her work has appeared in peer-reviewed publications such as the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Comparative Political Studies, Journal of Politics, and Science.
“Jennifer Pan is one of the most exciting, creative and innovative scholars in the field of social media and network analysis,” said Nathaniel Persily, co-director of the Cyber Policy Center. “She has written foundational works relating to the internet in China and has very important research underway concerning the effect of social media on politics in the United States.”
Pan graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University in 2004 and obtained a Ph.D. from Harvard University in 2015. Prior to Stanford, Pan was a consultant at McKinsey & Company. She was also a fellow at Stanford’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences from 2019 to 2020.
Pan’s research focuses on political and authoritarian politics, including how preferences and behaviors are shaped by political censorship, propaganda, and information manipulation.
During a speech at Stanford University on Thursday, April 21, 2022, former U.S. President Barack Obama presented his audience with a stark choice: “Do we allow our democracy to wither, or do we make it better?”
Over the course of an hour-long address, Obama outlined the threat that disinformation online, including deepfake technology powered by AI, poses to democracy as well as ways he thought the problems might be addressed in the United States and abroad.
“This is an opportunity, it’s a chance that we should welcome for governments to take on a big important problem and prove that democracy and innovation can coexist,” Obama said.
Obama, who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017, was the keynote speaker at a one-day symposium, titled “Challenges to Democracy in the Digital Information Realm,” co-hosted by the Stanford Cyber Policy Center and the Obama Foundation on the Stanford campus on April 21.
The event brought together people working in technology, policy, and academia for panel discussions on topics ranging from the role of government in establishing online trust, the relationship between democracy and tech companies, and the threat of digital authoritarians.
Obama told a packed audience of more than 600 people in CEMEX auditorium – as well as more than 250,000 viewers tuning in online – that everyone is part of the solution to make democracy stronger in the digital age and that all of us – from technology companies and their employees to students and ordinary citizens – must work together to adapt old institutions and values to a new era of information. “If we do nothing, I’m convinced the trends that we’re seeing will get worse,” he said.
Introducing the former president was Michael McFaul, director at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and U.S. ambassador to Russia under Obama, and Stanford alum and Obama Foundation fellow, Tiana Epps-Johnson, BA ’08.
Epps-Johnson, who is the founder and executive director of the Center for Tech and Civic Life, recalled her time answering calls to an election protection hotline during the 2006 midterm election. She said the experience taught her an important lesson, which was that “the overall health of our democracy, whether we have a voting process that is fair and trustworthy, is more important than any one election outcome.”
Stanford freshman Evan Jackson said afterward that Obama’s speech resonated with him. “I use social media a lot, every day, and I’m always seeing all the fake news that can be spread easily. And I do understand that when you have controversy attached to what you’re saying, it can reach larger crowds,” Jackson said. “So if we do find a way to better contain the controversy and the fake news, it can definitely help our democracy stay powerful for our nation.”
In his keynote, Obama reflected on how technology has transformed the way people create and consume media. Digital and social media companies have upended traditional media – from local newspapers to broadcast television, as well as the role these outlets played in society at large.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the American public tuned in to one of three major networks, and while media from those earlier eras had their own set of problems – such as excluding women and people of color – they did provide people with a shared culture, Obama said.
Moreover, these media institutions, with established journalistic best practices for accuracy and accountability, also provided people with similar information: “When it came to the news, at least, citizens across the political spectrum tended to operate using a shared set of facts – what they saw or what they heard from Walter Cronkite or David Brinkley.”
Fast forward to today, where everyone has access to individualized news feeds that are fed by algorithms that reward the loudest and angriest voices (and which technology companies profit from). “You have the sheer proliferation of content, and the splintering of information and audiences,” Obama observed. “That’s made democracy more complicated.”
Facts are competing with opinions, conspiracy theories, and fiction. “For more and more of us, search and social media platforms aren’t just our window into the internet. They serve as our primary source of news and information,” Obama said. “No one tells us that the window is blurred, subject to unseen distortions, and subtle manipulations.”
The splintering of news sources has also made all of us more prone to what psychologists call “confirmation bias,” Obama said. “Inside our personal information bubbles, our assumptions, our blind spots, our prejudices aren’t challenged, they are reinforced and naturally, we’re more likely to react negatively to those consuming different facts and opinions – all of which deepens existing racial and religious and cultural divides.”
But the problem is not just that our brains can’t keep up with the growing amount of information online, Obama argued. “They’re also the result of very specific choices made by the companies that have come to dominate the internet generally, and social media platforms in particular.”
The former president also made clear that he did not think technology was to blame for many of our social ills. Racism, sexism, and misogyny, all predate the internet, but technology has helped amplify them.
“Solving the disinformation problem won’t cure all that ails our democracies or tears at the fabric of our world, but it can help tamp down divisions and let us rebuild the trust and solidarity needed to make our democracy stronger,” Obama said.
He gave examples of how social media has fueled violence and extremism around the world. For example, leaders from countries such as Russia to China, Hungary, the Philippines, and Brazil have harnessed social media platforms to manipulate their populations. “Autocrats like Putin have used these platforms as a strategic weapon against democratic countries that they consider a threat,” Obama said.
He also called out emerging technologies such as AI for their potential to sow further discord online. “I’ve already seen demonstrations of deep fake technology that show what looks like me on a screen, saying stuff I did not say. It’s a strange experience people,” Obama said. “Without some standards, implications of this technology – for our elections, for our legal system, for our democracy, for rules of evidence, for our entire social order – are frightening and profound.”
Obama discussed potential solutions for addressing some of the problems he viewed as contributing to a backsliding of democracy in the second half of his talk.
In an apt metaphor for a speech delivered in Silicon Valley, Obama compared the U.S. Constitution to software for running society. It had “a really innovative design,” Obama said, but also significant bugs. “Slavery. You can discriminate against entire classes of people. Women couldn’t vote. Even white men without property couldn’t vote, couldn’t participate, weren’t part of ‘We the People.’”
The amendments to the Constitution were akin to software patches, the former president said, that allowed us to “continue to perfect our union.”
Similarly, governments and technology companies should be willing to introduce changes aimed at improving civil discourse online and reducing the amount of disinformation on the internet, Obama said.
“The internet is a tool. Social media is a tool. At the end of the day, tools don’t control us. We control them. And we can remake them. It’s up to each of us to decide what we value and then use the tools we’ve been given to advance those values,” he said.
The former president put forth various solutions for combating online disinformation, including regulation, which many tech companies fiercely oppose.
“Here in the United States, we have a long history of regulating new technologies in the name of public safety, from cars and airplanes to prescription drugs to appliances,” Obama said. “And while companies initially always complain that the rules are going to stifle innovation and destroy the industry, the truth is that a good regulatory environment usually ends up spurring innovation, because it raises the bar on safety and quality. And it turns out that innovation can meet that higher bar.”
In particular, Obama urged policymakers to rethink Section 230, enacted as part of the United States Communications Decency Act in 1996, which stipulates that generally, online platforms cannot be held liable for content that other people post on their website.
But technology has changed dramatically over the past two decades since Section 230 was enacted, Obama said. “These platforms are not like the old phone company.”
He added: “In some cases, industry standards may replace or substitute for regulation, but regulation has to be part of the answer.”
Obama also urged technology companies to be more transparent in how they operate and “at minimum” should share with researchers and regulators how some of their products and services are designed so there is some accountability.
The responsibility also lies with ordinary citizens, the former president said. “We have to take it upon ourselves to become better consumers of news – looking at sources, thinking before we share, and teaching our kids to become critical thinkers who know how to evaluate sources and separate opinion from fact.”
Obama warned that if the U.S. does not act on these issues, it risks being eclipsed in this arena by other countries. “As the world’s leading democracy, we have to set a better example. We should be able to lead on these discussions internationally, not [be] in the rear. Right now, Europe is forging ahead with some of the most sweeping legislation in years to regulate the abuses that are seen in big tech companies,” Obama said. “Their approach may not be exactly right for the United States, but it points to the need for us to coordinate with other democracies. We need to find our voice in this global conversation.”
At a conference hosted by the Cyber Policy Center and Obama Foundation, former U.S. President Barack Obama delivered the keynote address about how information is created and consumed, and the threat that disinformation poses to democracy.
The disclosures made by whistleblower Frances Haugen about Facebook — first to the Wall Street Journal and then to “60 Minutes” — ought to be the stuff of shareholders’ nightmares: When she left Facebook, she took with her documents showing, for example, that Facebook knew Instagram was making girls’ body-image issues worse, that internal investigators knew a Mexican drug cartel was using the platform to recruit hit men and that the company misled its own oversight board about having a separate content appeals process for a large number of influential users. (Haugen is scheduled to appear before a Congressional panel on Tuesday.)
Facebook, however, may be too big for the revelations to hurt its market position — a sign that it may be long past time for the government to step in and regulate the social media company. But in order for policymakers to effectively regulate Facebook — as well as Google, Twitter, TikTok and other Internet companies — they need to understand what is actually happening on the platforms.
The social media company shouldn’t be able to hide information about whether and how it harms users (from the Washington Post)
Cyber Initiative grantees and researchers in the news, February 2019
Here is a selection of Cyber Initiative grantee and researcher publications and citations for February 2019:
1-30-2019: Larry Diamond “Chinese Influence, American Interests” in The Diplomat.
1-30-19: Michelle Mello “Stanford’s Michelle Mello on Latest Measles Outbreak” in SLS Blogs.
1/31/19: Matthew Gentzkow “How Quitting Facebook Could Change Your Life” in Fortune.
1/30/29: Matthew Gentzkow “This is Your Brain Off Facebook” in Health.
2/3/19: Herb Lin “Atomic Scientists: Hunanity flirting with annhilation” in Tribune.
2/4/19: Matthew Gentzkow “Quitting Facebook makes people happier, study finds” in Irish Examiner.
2/6/19: Herb Lin “Add cybersecurity to Doomsday Clock concerns, says Bulletin of Atomic Scientists” in CSO.
2/6/19: Herb Lin “Add cybersecurity to Doomsday Clock concerns, says Bulletin of Atomic Scientists” in CIO.
2/8/19: Elaine Treharne “Statement on the Hoover Institution” in The Stanford Daily.
2/13/19: Michelle Mello “Stanford’s Michael Wald on Vaccinations, Children’s Rights, and the Law” in The Stanford Report.
2/15/19: Fei-Fei Li and Elaine Treharne “Human-centered Artificial Intelligence Initiative talks AI, humanities and the arts” in The Stanford Daily.
2/19/19: Fei-Fei Li “5 Women advancing AI industry research” in Tech Talks.
2/19/19: Fei-Fei Li “10 AI influencers you should be following on Twitter” in Siliconrepublic.com.
2/22/19 Larry Diamond “Utah Against Health Insurance” in New York Times.
2/23/19 Sharad Goel “Algorithms Can Decide Pre-Trial Jail” in urbanmilwaukee.
2/25/19: Dan Boneh “Zether developers from Stanford aim to add new layer of privacy to Ethereum” in Dapp Life.
2/26/19: Susan Athey “Ripple Lead on Questions – Student Seeks Clarification for Promoting XRP Over Bitcoin in Stanford University" in CoinGape.
2/26/19: Larry Diamond “George Pyle: Utah’s Medicaid reversal makes us a fool coast-to-coast” in Salt Lake Tribune.
2/27/19: Arnold Milstein “AI will not solve health care challenges now, but there are innovative alternatives, researcher writes” in Scope.
2/28/19: Dan Boneh “New Privacy Protocol Zether Can Conceal Ethereum Transactions” in Blockonomi.
2/28/19: Jure Leskovec “Species evolve ways to back up life's machinery” in Phys.org.
2/28/19: Matthew Gentzkow “What happens when you get off Facebook for four weeks? Stanford researchers found out” in Recode.
Tuesday, April 24, 2018
RSVP required online.
The consequences of contemporary technological innovations for the lives and values of future generations are enormous. The wide range of expected – and unexpected – applications require rethinking governance arrangements, legal regimes, economic structures, and social relations. Exploration of such topics is the subject of the 2017-18 CASBS symposium series.
The first symposium, held in November 2017, focused on “AI, Automation, and Society.” Read about and view a video of that event here.
The second symposium, held in March 2018, involved “The Effects of Technology on Human Interactions.” View the event video here.
In this final installment of the 2017-18 series, CASBS presents a conversation featuring two 2017-18 CASBS fellows – Stanford professor Nate Persily, an expert on law, democracy, and the internet; and Carrie Cihak, a senior policy expert and practitioner at one of the most innovative county governments in the U.S. They will outline the challenges that recent technology-based advances pose to democracy, public policy, and governance systems. Social media platforms increasingly are viewed as vehicles for exploiting political discourse, rather than as democratizing forces. How should our institutions respond? Though modern technological innovations more easily connect people, what are the implications for issues of “digital equity,” government capacity, and regulatory frameworks? Though the positive impacts are substantial, how do we address the numerous negative impacts of the technology sector’s concentration in certain regional economies – including the San Francisco Bay Area and the greater Seattle area? These are just a few questions that will stimulate a thought-provoking discussion between the panelists and with the audience.
As Chief of Policy for King County Executive Dow Constantine, the highest ranking elected official of King County, WA, the 13th largest county in the United States, Carrie S. Cihak is responsible for identifying the highest priority policy areas and community outcomes for leadership focus and for developing and launching innovative solutions to issues that are complex, controversial and cross-sectoral. She is an architect of some of the county’s key initiatives, such as Best Starts for Kids as well as nationally-recognized work on equity and social justice. Prior to her work in Constantine’s administration, Cihak served for eight years as a senior-level analyst for the King County Council and as lead staff for the King County Board of Health. She also served as a staff economist on international trade and finance for President Clinton's Council of Economic Advisers. As a policy fellow during the 2017-18 academic year, Cihak is leading projects at CASBS and in King County that advance meaningful collaboration between academic researchers and governments. She is spearheading efforts in King County on evidence-informed decision making and is co-director of CASBS’s Impact Evaluation Design Lab, launched in March 2018. She is also using time at CASBS to explore the science and evidence-base of belonging, while working back home to help launch a cross-sector partnership called “You Belong Here,” which seeks to build civic muscle and inclusive growth in the Seattle region.
Nate Persily is the James B. McClatchy Professor of Law at Stanford Law School, with appointments in the departments of political science, communication and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. Prior to joining Stanford, Persily taught at Columbia University and the University of Pennsylvania Law School, and as a visiting professor at Harvard, NYU, Princeton, the University of Amsterdam, and the University of Melbourne. His scholarship and legal practice focus on American election law or what is sometimes called the “law of democracy,” which addresses issues such as voting rights, political parties, campaign finance, redistricting, and election administration. He has served as a special master or court-appointed expert to craft congressional or legislative districting plans for Georgia, Maryland, Connecticut, New York and, most recently, North Carolina. He also served as the Senior Research Director for the Presidential Commission on Election Administration. In addition to numerous articles (many cited by the Supreme Court) on the legal regulation of political parties, issues surrounding the census and redistricting process, voting rights, and campaign finance reform, Persily is coauthor of an election law casebook, The Law of Democracy. As a fellow at CASBS supported by the Annenberg Foundation, he is examining the impact of changing technology on political communication, campaigns, and election administration. In 2016, he received an Andrew Carnegie Fellowship to pursue this work. Persily also co-directs the Stanford Project on Democracy and the Internet.
*There will be valet parking at the event.
Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University
75 Alta Road
Stanford, CA 94305
Encina Hall
616 Jane Stanford Way
Stanford, CA 94305-6055
Michael McFaul is the Ken Olivier and Angela Nomellini Professor of International Studies in Political Science, Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies, and the Peter and Helen Bing Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, all at Stanford University. He joined the Stanford faculty in 1995 and served as FSI Director from 2015 to 2025. He is also an international affairs analyst for MSNOW.
McFaul served for five years in the Obama administration, first as Special Assistant to the President and Senior Director for Russian and Eurasian Affairs at the National Security Council at the White House (2009-2012), and then as U.S. Ambassador to the Russian Federation (2012-2014).
McFaul has authored ten books and edited several others, including, most recently, Autocrats vs. Democrats: China, Russia, America, and the New Global Disorder, as well as From Cold War to Hot Peace: An American Ambassador in Putin’s Russia, (a New York Times bestseller) Advancing Democracy Abroad: Why We Should, How We Can; and Russia’s Unfinished Revolution: Political Change from Gorbachev to Putin.
He is a recipient of numerous awards, including an honorary PhD from Montana State University; the Order for Merits to Lithuania from President Gitanas Nausea of Lithuania; Order of Merit of Third Degree from President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, and the Dean’s Award for Distinguished Teaching at Stanford University. In 2015, he was the Distinguished Mingde Faculty Fellow at the Stanford Center at Peking University.
McFaul was born and raised in Montana. He received his B.A. in International Relations and Slavic Languages and his M.A. in Soviet and East European Studies from Stanford University in 1986. As a Rhodes Scholar, he completed his D. Phil. in International Relations at Oxford University in 1991.
