Global Democracy Coalition Forum

The Global Democracy Coalition, a global multi-stakeholder coalition for democracy, gathered in a virtual forum on 7 December 2021, convened by the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA). The purpose of the Global Democracy Coalition Forum was to galvanize a global conversation on democracy, prior to the Summit for Democracy which was held on 9-10 December 2021.

As a part of this initiative, CEPPS hosted a panel on Elections and the  Digital Transformation. This panel brought together perspectives from around the world to discuss approaches to confronting the effects of the world’s digital transformation on elections. It included the roles of technology companies, election management bodies, observers, civil society and others, and considered specific responses to attacks on elections and the democratic process more broadly. The discussion focused on the implications of the transformation and the ways that the panelists have engaged in developing solutions to confronting negative trends and building democratic, open and free political systems and societies online and off, globally.

As part of the forum, IDEA International published recommendations from all the panel discussions from the forum. Recommendations from this panel include:

• The most important thing is collaboration. Working with local civil society gives election work and outcomes legitimacy.
• Platforms are seeing that disinformation affects their public image and are more helpful now than they have been in the past. Self-regulation by the platforms is important in addition to government regulation. They need clear rules for moderating content, this should be incentivized, and they need to be transparent in these rules.
• Company platforms need to be able to counter disinformation across their platforms if they want to work and engage on these international scales.

Watch the CEPPS panel on Elections and the Digital Transformation now!

This panel brought together perspectives from around the world to discuss approaches to confronting the effects of the world’s digital transformation on elections. This includes the roles of technology companies, election management bodies, observers, civil society and more. Panelists considered specific responses to attacks on elections and the democratic process more broadly.

DISCUSSION PANEL

• Justice Luís Roberto Barroso, Brazil TSE
• Idayat Hassan, Director, CDD-West Africa
• Suzanne Nossel, CEO, Pen America and member of the Meta Oversight Board
• MODERATOR: Julia Brothers, CEPPS/NDI