"Strengthening Information Integrity in the Humanitarian Context"
Date: Wednesday, 9 April, 10:15 ¨C 11:15 am EDT
Modality: Virtual event via Zoom meeting
Recording: The link to recording will be available soon.
Organizers:
Description:
Technological advances revolutionized communications, connecting people on a previously unthinkable scale. They have supported communities in crisis, elevated marginalized voices, mobilized global movements for racial justice and gender equality. Yet these same advances elevated risks to information integrity undermining trust, shared understanding, and public discourse. New and escalating risks brought by AI technologies made strengthening information integrity one of the urgent tasks of our time. This clear and present global threat demands coordinated global action.
The United Nations Global Principles for Information Integrity show us another future is possible, where information ecosystems foster trust, promote responsible innovation, empower individuals and communities worldwide. They also aim to redress power imbalances so that global information flows are no longer monopolized by a small group of actors - including technology companies based in a handful of countries. The principles envision an information ecosystem that delivers choice, freedom, privacy, and safety for all, in which people everywhere can express themselves freely and make informed, independent decisions. They put forward proposals to empower people by handing them greater control over the media they choose to consume, their own online experiences, and how their personal data is used. The principles offer support to all those working to share facts in the public interest, and the vulnerable or marginalized voices that so often bear the brunt of hate campaigns.
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Run of Event
- 10:15 - 10:20 am EDT: Opening Remarks by Dr. MJ Bosia, Executive Director, International Studies Association; Professor of Political Science and International Relations, Saint Michael¡¯s College, Vermont; Director, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Saint Michael¡¯s College, Vermont.
- 10:20 - 10:45 am EDT: A Conversation with Melissa Fleming, UN Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications moderated by Dr. Punam Yadav, Associate Professor in Humanitarian Studies at University College London.
- 10:45 - 11:10 am EDT: Q&A Session
- 11:10 - 11:15 am EDT: Closing Remarks
Featured Speakers
Ms. Melissa Fleming
UN Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications
Ms. Melissa Fleming leads the UN¡¯s Department of Global Communications, which informs global audiences about the state of the world and engages them to build support for the work and goals of the UN. In this role, Ms. Fleming oversees the Department¡¯s strategic and crisis communications operations, including its multilingual news and digital media services, public outreach programmes, and global campaigns.
Dr. MJ Bosia
Executive Director, International Studies Association; Professor of Political Science and International Relations, Saint Michael¡¯s College, Vermont; Director, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Saint Michael¡¯s College, Vermont
MJ ¡°Mike¡± Bosia is Executive Director of the International Studies Association, and a Professor of Political Science and International Relations as well as Director of Gender and Sexuality Studies at Saint Michael¡¯s College in Vermont. Bosia¡¯s research is at the nexus of state action and social movements, first looking to the slow response from governments to HIV/AIDS and the subsequent militancy amongst communities most at risk for the disease. They also focused on emerging food sovereignty movements reacting to state-directed market reforms, and on what they call ¡°state homophobia¡± as a modular toolkit of policies, practices, and rhetorics used to legitimize state power and/or opposition forces whilst creating the categories through which sexuality and gender are contested globally. Bosia has conducted research in France, Uganda, Egypt, the US, and India, and is co-editor of Global Homophobia: States, Movements, and the Politics of Oppression (University of Illinois Press), Globalization and Food Sovereignty (University of Toronto Press), and The Oxford Handbook on Global LGBT and Sexual Diversity Politics (Oxford University Press). Their current project focuses on late 20th century changes to the urban landscape brought about by global economic forces that provided space for a transnational network of punk and queer artists.
Dr. Punam Yadav
Chair, ISA-UNAI Coordination Committee; Associate Professor in Humanitarian Studies, University College London; Director, UCL Humanitarian Institute; Co-Director, Centre for Gender and Disaster, Department of Risk and Disaster Reduction, University College London
Dr. Punam Yadav is the Chair of the ISA-UNAI Coordination Committee. She is an Associate Professor in Humanitarian Studies at the University College London and serves as the Director of UCL Humanitarian Institute and Co-Director of the Centre for Gender and Disaster at the Department of Risk and Disaster Reduction. As a scholar in Feminist Â鶹´«Ã½ Research and Gender and Disaster studies, Dr Yadav has made significant contributions to scholarship by theorising the process of social transformation through a gender lens. One of her key contributions is bringing conflict into the conversation of disaster and framing gender, conflict and disaster as a continuum. Dr Yadav began her career as a development practitioner in Nepal, working for over a decade with various international and national NGOs before transitioning into academia. Dr Yadav has authored several notable publications, including the article "Can women benefit from war? Women's agency in conflict and post-conflict contexts," published in the Journal of Â鶹´«Ã½ Research. This article has remained one of the top 20 most-read pieces in the journal since its publication, with over 14,000 views and downloads. Her academic monograph Social Transformation in Post-conflict Nepal: A Gender Perspective, published by Routledge in 2016, has also been translated into Chinese. Dr Yadav was invited by the President of UN General Assembly in January 2017 for a high-level dialogue on Building Sustainable Â鶹´«Ã½ for All.