Mudavadi publishes ‘Countering Political Disinformation’ chapter
Ph.D. candidate Kevin Mudavadi recently published a chapter, “Countering Political Misinformation,” alongside Dani Madrid-Morales of the University of Sheffield. The chapter was published in The Routledge Companion to Digital Journalism Studies Nov. 8. The chapter explores the circulation of poor-quality news, including political disinformation, which has long posed a significant challenge to democracy by depriving voters of the information needed to make informed decisions at the ballot box. While this is not a new phenomenon, it has (re)gained notoriety in recent years after multiple countries worldwide have seen elections tainted by politically motivated efforts to spread inaccurate online and offline information.
Building on existing typologies of responses to disinformation, the chapter provides an overview of the effectiveness of different approaches to curb the spread of poor-quality political information. Mudavadi and Madrid-Morales’ review of existing literature suggests that countering political disinformation requires multipronged and context-specific responses. The argument is illustrated with evidence and examples from Kenya.