I will take part as an expert and presenter in the workshop on “Studying Russian disinformation and its effects in Europe".  It will take place on 19-20 June 2017 and will be hosted by the Graduate School for East and Southeast European Studies at Ludwig-Maximilian University Munich in Germany. 

This workshop will bring together political scientists, media and political communication scholars and journalists and experts that deal with Russian disinformation on a daily basis. The purpose is to systematically assess the phenomenon, uncover typical pitfalls in the study of Russian disinformation and to develop a systematic approach to this subject paying particular attention to the variety of tools and techniques that can be used for the analysis, representation and visualisation of findings from different types of material and including large data analysis projects.

To kick off the discussions in each workshop section, we are asking our expert participants to share their insights from their practical work with Russian disinformation and fake news and the impact it has on their work and on targets of disinformation, fake and false news. We ask our academic participants to present their theoretical, empirical, methodological and hands-on technical insights and share their experiences of practical problems, strengths and weaknesses of different approaches.

Given my  research expertise in this field, I will  present  insights on the issue of the impact of Russian propaganda in Germany.

Our aim is to discuss how the mechanisms and effects of Russian disinformation and fake news, circulating in traditional news outlets and on social media, can best be studied. It is also necessary, in our view, to embark on a critical discussion of the concepts that are used in the debate – and generally taken for granted - and their operationalization in empirical studies. We are in particular interested in debating how the application of innovative approaches, analytical tools (including the latest software), and research methods used in media and communication studies can help us establish causality and origin of disinformation campaigns and to assess and measure the effects of Russian disinformation on perceptions and public opinion in different countries and among different groups in society.

The workshop is designed to approach the research problems from a cross- disciplinary perspective and to engage in a discussion about practical challenges in this field of study with demonstrations of different types of data analysis tools by experts and scholars from the perspectives of political science, media and communication and Russian (dis)information campaigns. The workshop will address theoretical, methodological, and empirical questions, trying to systematize the existing knowledge and contribute to the development of the field across different case studies, countries, time-periods and media types.