CMPF director Pier Luigi Parcu was recently interviewed for an article in the newspaper of the European University Institute, EUI Times.

In the article ”Social media: Democracy’s poisoned chalice,” by EUI Times journalist Henry Goodwin, Parcu speaks about the effects of social media on democracy.

Pier Luigi Parcu, Director of the Centre for Media Pluralism and Media Freedom at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, rejects the notion that social media ‘were good before and are bad now’. ‘Social media is an instrument,’ he told EUI Times, ‘and instruments can be used in positive and negative ways.’ That we may now be seeing the negatives ‘more clearly’ does not mean that blame should be placed at the door of the instrument itself, he says. Rather, ‘it is the use of the instrument’ that is the problem.

‘We are undoubtedly seeing increased manipulation and polarisation on social media, but I think this is the manifestation of deeper societal questions,’ Professor Parcu explained, pointing to widening inequality, the rise of populism and the challenges posed by mass migration as creating ‘a very polarised society’.

The article also discusss the difficulties of applying laws governing traditional media, such as ownership concentration, libel and political advertising during electoral campaigns to the Internet.

Read the full text of the article here.