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Securing Democracy Dispatch
Announcements ASD would like your feedback! Please fill out our survey about ASD’s work and publications. (Estimated time to complete: one minute or less) ASD is hiring a Washington, DC-based, full-time program assistant! Apply here. Our Takes The danger of artificial intelligence (AI) is not just that it can make us believe “things that are not real, it’s that it can get us to start doubting the things that are real”, Senior Fellow Bret Schafer said at GMF Brussels Forum 2024. Get smart on AI and the information space in less than 10 minutes here. Democracies across Europe face increasingly sophisticated influence campaigns taking aim at elections. European countries mu
Building Resilience Against Election Influence Operations: Preparing for the European Elections in 2024 and Beyond
Executive Summary In 2024, nearly half of the world’s population is heading to the polls. One of the biggest of these contests is the 2024 European Parliament elections from June 6–9, in which 366 million voters in the union’s 27 member states will elect 720 members of the European Parliament (EP). This year’s elections are taking place amid increasingly shifting geopolitical and technological landscapes. Now is the time for European countries and their partners to review and adapt the tools in their arsenals to combat malign election influence operations. Understanding that countries can mount a strong defense of their democratic processes by continually learning from each o
New Report Highlights Best Practices to Counter Election Disinformation
Experts examined five case studies—in France, Sweden, Estonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Ukraine—to highlight effective practices as half the world’s population heads to the polls. WASHINGTON, DC — The Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) at the German Marshall Fund, in partnership with the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES), today released a new report titled “Building Resilience Against Election Influence Operations: Preparing for the European Elections in 2024 and Beyond.” With elections taking place this year in which nearly half the world's population will head to the polls, the report provides timely insights and recommendations for how countries
Securing Democracy Dispatch
Announcements GMF’s annual Brussels Forum is live today, April 18 and tomorrow, April 19! Tune in here to follow conversations on issues impacting the transatlantic community, including a panel about challenges to election administration on April 19 at 9:15 CEST moderated by GMF Senior Vice President of Democracy Laura Thornton and a discussion about artificial intelligence’s (AI) impact on the information space, moderated by ASD Senior Fellow Bret Schafer on April 19 at 10:05 CEST. ASD is hiring a Washington, DC-based, full-time program assistant! Apply here. Our Takes The Georgian government reintroduced a controversial foreign agent law after revoking it last year due to p
If at First You Don’t Succeed (at Repressing Dissent) Try, Try Again
With democratic decline on display around the world, Georgia should be on our mind. Policy Recommendations The US and EU governments should insist that the Georgian government invite the European Commission for Democracy through Law (the Venice Commission) to evaluate the controversial Foreign Agent Law that Tbilisi recently reintroduced. The United States and the EU should also insist that the Georgian Parliament not hold a vote on the law until the Venice Commission has issued its findings. The US Department of State should convey that if the ruling party rushes the law through without waiting for feedback from the Venice Commission, or in contravention of the Commission’s
Securing Democracy Dispatch
Announcements We are hiring! ASD is looking for a full-time program assistant and a Washington, DC-based research trainee for Summer 2024! Apply here. Hamilton 2.0 Analysis Russian diplomats and state media focused on two main narratives this week: American Mercenaries in Ukraine: Several Russian state media outlets alleged last week that US mercenaries are operating covertly in Ukraine. The most viewed post from monitored Telegram channels was an allegation that a photo taken from the phone of a dead soldier, who pro-Russian sources claimed was “not Ukrainian”, showed a photo of a child who had the motto of the US Rangers written on his back. RIA Novosti further clai
Securing Democracy Dispatch
Announcements We are hiring! Applications are open for ASD at GMF’s Washington, DC-based research traineeship for Summer 2024! Apply here. Our Takes The spate of US election officials resigning increases the risk that genuine election administration mistakes happen—especially when election offices “aren’t able to bring on an experienced person to help steer the ship”, Senior Fellow David Levine told Talking Points Memo. Beyond satellite broadband, Western democracies will need to pursue “a broad and diverse array of submarine and terrestrial cables” to connect their infrastructure with the Global South’s—and to combat Beijing’s advances, China Tech Analyst Dyl
Could Satellite Broadband Combat the Digital Silk Road?
At the inaugural Belt and Road Forum in 2017, the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) leader, Xi Jinping, made a pitch to the global south: the PRC could help develop partnering countries by building “big data, cloud computing, and smart cities” infrastructure, and in doing so, “connect them into the Digital Silk Road (DSR) of the 21st century.” The DSR has two functions. First, as Chinese technology companies face a saturated domestic market, and greater scrutiny in advanced democracies, they hope the Global South’s economies can be cultivated into alternative markets. Second, PRC-built digital infrastructure would firmly embed authoritarian principles within the very fabric
Securing Democracy Dispatch
Our Takes If hard right parties translate their momentum into success in June’s European Parliament elections, they will have a large impact on the EU’s future, from who occupies key offices to the bloc’s support for Ukraine, Senior Manager for Europe and Fellow Vassilis Ntousas and GMF’s Clara Volintiru write for GMF. Russian claims that the United States and Ukraine were somehow behind last week’s terrorist attack in Moscow help the regime argue “that the fight is justified and they need to continue”, Senior Fellow Bret Schafer told The New York Times. People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) state media outlets “seem to be supporting Russia’s allegations regarding
Securing Democracy Dispatch
Our Takes “Information ecosystems were under unprecedented strain … and then you throw artificial intelligence (AI) into the mix. And what you have is such a harsher threat landscape”, Senior Manager for Europe and Fellow Vassilis Ntousas said at an event organized by ASD and the governments of Canada and Latvia in Seoul, South Korea on the sidelines of the third Summit for Democracy. The TikTok bill moving through the US Congress is imperfect, but nevertheless “gets to the heart of the matter” by questioning the Chinese Communist Party’s ownership and influence over the platform, Senior Fellow Lindsay Gorman said on BBC Sounds. “Not even Portugal can any longer be seen