FolioStart free

Political Science · Literature

Research papers on Disinformation and elections

Recent and highly-cited academic work on disinformation and elections, gathered from Semantic Scholar, CrossRef and OpenAlex.

Search all 200M+ papers on this topic, free →Or track new disinformation and elections papers automatically as they publish

  3. AI Threats to Politics, Elections, and Democracy: A Blockchain-Based Deepfake Authenticity Verification Framework

    M. B. E. Islam, Muhammad Haseeb, Hina Batool, et al. · 2024 · Blockchains · 38 citations

    The integrity of global elections is increasingly under threat from artificial intelligence (AI) technologies. As AI continues to permeate various aspects of society, its influence on political processes and elections has become a critical area of concern. This is because AI language models are far from neutral or objective; they inherit biases from their training data and the individuals who design and utilize them, which can sway voter decisions and affect global elections and democracy. In this research paper, we explore how AI can directly impact election outcomes through various techniques. These include the use of generative AI for disseminating false political information, favoring ce

    Save this paper

  4. Disinformation in Elections

    Max Bader · 2018 · Security and Human Rights · 23 citations

    In recent years there has been increasing attention to the potentially disruptive influence of disinformation on elections. The most common forms of disinformation in elections include the dissemination of ‘fake news’ in order to discredit opponents or to influence the voting process, the falsification or manipulation of polling data, and the use of fake election monitoring and observation. This article presents an overview of the phenomenon of disinformation in elections in both democratic and undemocratic environments, and discusses measures to reduce its scope and negative impact.

    Save this paper

  5. Russian Meddling in U.S. Elections: How News of Disinformation’s Impact Can Affect Trust in Electoral Outcomes and Satisfaction with Democracy

    Andrew R. N. Ross, Cristian Vaccari, A. Chadwick · 2022 · Mass Communication and Society · 22 citations

    ABSTRACT Russia’s Internet Research Agency (R-IRA) has been a key focus of disinformation research due to its attempts to use social media to influence the outcome of the 2016 United States presidential election. However, questions remain about the extent to which news coverage of the R-IRA’s efforts may have shaped public perceptions of U.S. democracy. To assess its impact, we ran an experiment involving U.S. social media users (N = 916). We tested whether reading news reports about the R-IRA’s activities heightened perceptions that the R-IRA influenced the public’s vote choices, and whether this influence in turn reduced confidence in the outcomes of the 2016 and 2020 elections and broader

    Save this paper

  6. Disinformation, Misinformation, and Democracy

    Ronald James Krotoszynski · 2025 · Cambridge University Press eBooks · 8 citations

    The 2024 presidential election in the USA demonstrates, with unmistakable clarity, that disinformation (intentionally false information) and misinformation (unintentionally false information disseminated in good faith) pose a real and growing existential threat to democratic self-government in the United States – and elsewhere too. Powered by social media outlets like Facebook (Meta) and Twitter (X), it is now possible to propagate empirically false information to a vast potential audience at virtually no cost. Coupled with the use of highly sophisticated algorithms that carefully target the recipients of disinformation and misinformation, voter manipulation is easier to accomplish than ever

    Save this paper

  7. Navigating the Nexus of Elections, Technology and Democracy amid Escalating Disinformation and Misinformation Challenges in Kenya

    Victoria Miyandazi, Lucianna Thuo · 2025 · Cambridge University Press eBooks · 8 citations

    Despite Kenya’s transformative and progressive 2010 Constitution, it is still grappling with a hybrid democracy, displaying both authoritarian and democratic traits. Scholars attribute this status to several factors, with a prominent one being the domination of the political order and wielding of political power by a few individuals and families with historical ties to patronage networks and informal power structures. The persisting issues of electoral fraud, widespread corruption, media harassment, weak rule of law and governance challenges further contribute to the hybrid democracy status. While the 2010 Constitution aims to restructure the state and enhance democratic institutions, the tr

    Save this paper

  8. The European Union’s Governance Approach to Tackling Disinformation – protection of democracy, foreign influence, and the quest for digital sovereignty

    Matthias Kachelmann, W. Reiners · 2023 · L'Europe en Formation · 7 citations

    Cet article présente une vue d’ensemble des caractéristiques de la désinformation à l’ère numérique, décrit l’évolution des efforts déployés par l’UE pour lutter contre la désinformation et fournit une analyse globale de l’approche de sa gouvernance en termes de politiques, d’acteurs et d’instruments politiques. Sur cette base, nous analysons sa compatibilité avec la quête de souveraineté numérique de l’UE. Les principales conclusions sont que l’UE a maintenu une approche particulièrement stable en combinant des instruments souples et fermes dans un cadre de corégulation qui implique des acteurs privés et publics. Nous concluons que l’interaction entre la nature de la désinformation, la conf

    Save this paper

  9. Lawfare in the Disinformation Age: Chinese Interference in Taiwan’s 2020 Elections

    Sean P. Quirk · 2021 · SSRN Electronic Journal · 4 citations

    Despite an aggressive disinformation campaign from the People’s Republic of China (“PRC”), Taiwan effectively countered false information coming from the PRC and maintained the integrity of its January 2020 elections. Political warfare between the PRC and Taiwan (the Republic of China) stretches back decades. However, the digital age has catalyzed the range and effectiveness of “disinformation”—the dissemination of false information with the intention to deceive public opinion. During Taiwan’s 2020 elections, PRC disinformation centered on the political unrest in Hong Kong and sought to sway Taiwanese public opinion toward candidates that were sympathetic to Beijing. Taiwan mounted a robust

    Save this paper

  11. Unravelling the web: exploring the dynamics of online disinformation and its impact on democracy in Africa

    K. Alberts · 2025 · Canadian Journal of African Studies / Revue canadienne des études africaines · 3 citations

    ABSTRACT The article looks at the influence of social media disinformation campaigns on voter behaviour in the national elections in Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa in the period 2017–2023. By examining the various communication efforts, propaganda and political marketing, the article shows how the digital revolution – with the help of such tools as artificial intelligence, algorithms, deepfakes and bots – has amplified the potential for disinformation to an unprecedented degree. By comparing three African countries in their respectively distinct stages of democratic consolidation, the article sheds light on how disinformation techniques impact the democratic fabric of these nations and to w

    Save this paper

  12. The impact of disinformation generated by AI on democracy case studies: the US presidential elections in 2016 & 2024

    Nourhan Tosson Ibrahim, Nada Adel Hanafi Mahmoud Attia · 2025 · Seikei ronsō/Review of economics and political science · 2 citations

    Purpose The paper studies the impact of disinformation generated by AI on democracy and it takes the US presidential elections in 2016 and 2024 as case studies. Design/methodology/approach The paper depended on analyzing three concepts in order to formulate a theoretical framework, which are “Democracy”, “Artificial Intelligence” and “Disinformation”. The study also used the comparative case study method in order to reach the similarities and differences that could be used to test the study's hypothesis. Findings It was found that there was an increasing impact of AI in the 2024 election than 2016 election and it is likely that its influence would increase more in the next years. Also, it wa

    Save this paper

  13. Politics and Propaganda on Social Media: How Twitter and Meta Moderate State-Linked Information Operations

    Nihat Muğurtay, Umut Duygu, Onur Varol · 2024 · ArXiv · 2 citations

    Why do Social Media Corporations (SMCs) engage in state-linked information operations? Social media can significantly influence the global political landscape, allowing governments and other political entities to engage in concerted information operations, shaping or manipulating domestic and foreign political agendas. In response to state-linked political manipulation tactics on social media, Twitter and Meta carried out take-down operations against propaganda networks, accusing them of interfering foreign elections, organizing disinformation campaigns, manipulating political debates and many other issues. This research investigates the two SMCs' policy orientation to explain which factors

    Save this paper

  14. AI-Driven Disinformation and Political Influence on WhatsApp in South Africa’s 2024 Elections

    Gregory Gondwe · 2025 · The International Journal of Press/Politics · 2 citations

    This study investigates the role of encrypted messaging apps, specifically WhatsApp, in disseminating political disinformation during South Africa’s 2024 general elections. Drawing on a dataset of 22,384 messages from 47 politically active WhatsApp groups and 6,283 unique users, the study identifies how AI-generated deepfakes, emotional manipulation, and ideological group structures facilitated the spread of false political narratives. Using MyFactChecker, an AI-powered sentiment and verification tool, we reveal that disinformation most frequently relied on fear-based appeals (41%), identity-driven rhetoric (32%), and content mimicking credible journalism (27%). The findings show that disinf

    Save this paper

  15. Computational Propaganda, Disinformation, And Democracy: Multidisciplinary Strategies For 2025

    K. Olawunmi · 2025 · International Journal of Social Science and Human Research · 2 citations

    The rise of computational propaganda has introduced unprecedented challenges for democratic governance, fueled by the rapid proliferation of disinformation, AI-generated content, and algorithm-driven influence campaigns. Unlike traditionalpropaganda, computational propaganda operates at scale, leveraging automation, synthetic media, and personalization to undermine trust, manipulate electorates, and exacerbate polarization. By 2025, these dynamics have intensified as advances in generative artificial intelligence and algorithmic amplification coincide with critical global elections and growing democratic fragility. This study pursues three objectives: first, to analyze the implications of co

    Save this paper

  16. Digital Democracy and Disinformation: The European Approach to Disinformation on Social Media in the Case of 2019 European Parliament Elections

    Dawid Aristotelis Fusiek, A. Stougiannou, Theoharris William Efthymiou-Egleton · 2022 · Journal of Politics and Ethics in New Technologies and AI · 2 citations

    This policy paper offers a brief overview of the hazards for digital democracy stemming from AI and digital tools and how the EU tackled online disinformation social media ahead of the 2019 European Parliament elections. The advent and introduction of social media into the political sphere has had a profound and substantial effect on Europe’s electoral processes affecting both voting behavior and the underlying factors that influence it. Whereas malicious actors often participating in disinformation have led to growing calls for reforms, this phenomenon has been most pronounced in the 2019 European parliament elections which saw an unprecedented reliance on digital media within the political

    Save this paper

  18. Framing disinformation and malign foreign information influence: A focus on the electoral arena

    Rosanna De Rosa, Annarita Criscitiello · 2025 · Media War & Conflict · 1 citations

    The assault on the Capitol (2021) in Washington, DC – and its replication in Brazil (2023) – has alerted the world to the effects of social media exposure to unverified information bringing (old) unresolved knots back to the attention of global public opinion. Like industrial waste, fake news, misinformation and post-truth contribute to polluting the wells from which democracy is fed – the autonomy of the public sphere and the reliability of the information system. Social media, with their algorithmic logic, have helped to consolidate the disinformation dynamic by exposing open societies to foreign interference. Using a conceptual matrix approach as a methodological tool to systematize the l

    Save this paper

  19. The Influence of Digital Democracy, Political Literacy, and Post-Truth Politics on Gen Z Political Participation in the 2024 Elections in Indonesia

    Agust Jovan Latuconsina, F. Suhariadi, Suparto Wijoyo, et al. · 2026 · F1000Research · 1 citations

    Background Digital democracy has transformed political communication and participation, especially among Generation Z voters who actively use social media and digital platforms. In the 2024 Indonesian election, digital spaces became important arenas for accessing political information, expressing opinions, and engaging in public debate. However, the rise of post-truth politics also created challenges through misinformation, disinformation, and emotionally driven political narratives. Methods This study used a quantitative survey design to examine the influence of digital democracy, political literacy, and post-truth politics on Generation Z’s political participation in the 2024 Indonesian el

    Save this paper

  20. Is Democracy Broken? Disinformation Wants You to Think That It Is

    Alexandra E. Cirone · 2025 · Cambridge University Press eBooks · 1 citations

    Social media has a complicated relationship with democracy. Although social media is neither democratic or undemocratic, it is an arena where different actors can promote or undermine democratization. Democracy is built on a foundation of norms and trust in institutions, where elections are the defining characteristic of the democratic process. This chapter outlines two ways disinformation campaigns can undermine democratic elections’ ability to ensure fair competition, representation, and accountability. First, disinformation narratives try to influence elections, by spreading false information about the voting process, or targeting voters, candidates, or parties to alter the outcome. Secon

    Save this paper

  22. Contesting democracy in the digital age: Disinformation, hate speech, and technology-enabled security threats during Kenya’s 2022 general elections

    Peter Kipng’eno Kirui · 2026 · African Journal of Empirical Research · 1 citations

    Social media use during elections has laid bare the opportunities and risks it portends for democracy and peace, especially for many consolidating democracies in Africa, such as Kenya. While digital democracy, defined as “the use of digital media in political and governance processes” has expanded the democratic space through increased participation, the digital space has also been used to spread disinformation and hate messages and have polarized populations and exacerbate the potential for conflict, particularly in charged political processes like elections. Interrogating Kenya’s 2022 General Election, this article aims at unpacking digital democracy as a tool that could threaten peace pri

    Save this paper

  23. The Growing Influence of Authoritarianism: A Challenge to Democracy Worldwide

    Fizza Ali Janjua, Maryam Iftikhar, Mahak Fatima Durrani, et al. · 2024 · GUMAN

    In recent years, authoritarianism has become increasingly popular in the world, challenging the democratic foundations and values. This article aims at analyzing the global tendency toward authoritarianism, at the same time referring to the cases of democratic regression in Hungary, Turkey, and Venezuela. The discussion explores the rationale of such dynamics, which include economic divide, political divide, social divide, technological divide, and globalization divide. Through analyzing various types of authoritarianism, from electoral one to the mixed ones, the article enlightens the reader about the ways such systems undermine the principles of democracy. The article goes on to expand on

    Save this paper

Write your paper with these sources

Folio is the integrity-first research workspace: search 200M+ papers, save sources, and write with citations that format themselves. Free for students and researchers.

Start writing free →