Robert Gorwa


WZB Berlin Social Science Center
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Hi! I am a researcher based at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center.

(If you're looking for a formal introduction for an event, I suggest that you navigate to my bios page.)

My research is at the intersection of technology and global regulation, bridging political science, law, and media studies. I'm conceptually most interested in the politics and institutions that shape public/private governance in the platformized digital economy, with a focus on social networks and AI systems. Empirically, I mainly do qualitative work, with a focus on textual, archival, and interview-based forms of policy tracing and analysis. I collaborate most actively with legal scholars and computer scientists, but also work happily with historians, communications researchers, political economists, and STS scholars.

I received my doctorate from the Department of Politics and International Relations at the University of Oxford, where my dissertation recieved the Winchester Prize. I previously studied at the Oxford Internet Institute and the University of British Columbia, and have conducted research at the Reuters Institute and European Studies Centre in Oxford as well as the Max Bell School of Public Policy at McGill. I have held fellowships or other visiting positions at the Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) in DC, USC's Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, Stanford's Center for Philanthropy and Civil Society, and the Weizenbaum Institute in Berlin.

My first book, The Politics of Platform Regulation, a comparative empirical study of the development of 'online safety' frameworks in the transnational context, was published open access in 2024 by Oxford University Press. My second book, Bad Computers, an investigation of the logics of governance in the AI stack, is a collaboration with the law and technology scholar Michael Veale and is forthcoming with MIT Press. I co-founded the Platform Governance Research Network (PlatGovNet) and organize a regular research seminar in Berlin on digital policy issues.

Publications

See also Google Scholar.

Closed publisher links are pink. Links to open access publications and preprints are green.

Books

  • Bad Computers: How the Wider AI Stack Can Stop the Worst AI Misuse.
    Michael Veale and Robert Gorwa, Forthcoming, MIT Press, 2027.
    Preprint
  • The Politics of Platform Regulation: How Governments Shape Online Content Moderation.
    Robert Gorwa, 2024.
    Oxford University Press PDF

Articles

Chapters

  • Democratic Transparency in the Platform Society
    Robert Gorwa and Timothy Garton Ash, 2020
    In Social Media and Democracy: The State of the Field and Prospects for Reform
    Cambridge University Press
  • Big Tech Hits the Diplomatic Circuit: Norm Entrepreneurship, Policy Advocacy, and Microsoft's Cybersecurity Tech Accord
    Robert Gorwa and Anton Peez, 2020
    In Governing Cyberspace: Behavior, Power, and Diplomacy
    Rowman & Littlefield
  • Prayer-Bots and Religious Worship on Twitter: A Call for a Wider Research Agenda
    Carl Ohman, Robert Gorwa, and Luciano Floridi, 2019
    In Ethics, Governance, and Policies in Artificial Intelligence
    Springer
    Minds & Machines
  • Poland: Unpacking the Ecosystem of Social Media Manipulation
    Robert Gorwa, 2018
    In Computational Propaganda: Parties, Politicians, and Manipulation on Social Media
    Oxford University Press

Reviews

  • Can Platforms Be Democratic?
    On Schneider's Governable Spaces and Gowder's Networked Leviathan, 2024
    Jacobin
  • Digital Oligarchy
    On Jillian York's Silicon Values, 2022
    LA Review of Books
  • How We Can Socialize Big Tech
    On James Muldoon's Platform Socialism, 2022
    Jacobin
  • The Last of the Unicorns
    On Siva Vaidhyanathan's Anti-Social Media, 2019
    LA Review of Books
  • Platform Moderation and its Discontents
    On Tarleton Gillespie's Custodians of the Internet, 2018
    LA Review of Books

Reports

  • Real Time Threats: Analysing Trust and Safety Practices for Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse (CSEA) Prevention on Livestreaming Platforms
    Robert Gorwa and Dhanaraj Thakur, 2024
    Center for Democracy and Technology
  • What Can Be Done? Digital Media Policy Options for Strengthening European Democracy
    Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, Robert Gorwa, and Madeleine de Cock Buning, 2019
    Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism
  • Lessons In Resilience: Canada's Digital Media Ecosystem and the 2019 Election
    Taylor Owen, Aengus Bridgeman, Robert Gorwa et al., 2019
    Public Policy Forum
  • Glasnost: Nine Ways that Facebook Could Make Itself a Better Forum for Free Speech and Democracy
    Timothy Garton Ash, Robert Gorwa, and Danae Metaxa, 2019
    Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism

Commentaries

  • Brazil Shows Platform Illiberalism is Big Tech’s New Normal
    If platform infrastructures cannot be regarded as neutral spaces to be studied, but as tools being wielded strategically by their politically motivated owners, where does that leave us?
    Clara Iglesias Keller, Robert Gorwa, and João C. Magalhães, 2026.
    Tech Policy Press
  • The Informal Future of Digital Governance
    Short video essay for the SSRC on transnational coordinating mechanisms for hard digital governance issues, touching on the C2PA, GIFCT, and more.
    Robert Gorwa, 2025
    Mediawell
  • Durov's Arrest and the Shadow Politics of Platform Regulation
    A summary of my book's arguments and a look at some of the actors and interests driving the recent battle between French law enfocement and Telegram.
    Robert Gorwa, 2024
    Tech Policy Press
  • Political Capital and Informal Platform Governance
    Blog post in symposium on 'jawboning' and informal forms of platform-state interactions.
    Robert Gorwa, 2024
    Center for Studies on Freedom of Expression
  • European Security Officials Double Down on Client-Side Scanning
    A few reflections on the transnational politics (and interest groups) driving EU draft CSAM proposals
    Robert Gorwa, 2022
    Lawfare
  • Expanding the Debate About Content Moderation
    A 'roundtable' piece with short inputs from a number of major names in the content moderation research space (honoured to be included!)
    Tarleton Gillespie et al., 2020
    Internet Policy Review
  • As Platforms Rely Less on Human Content Moderators, What's at Stake?
    Short invited contribution reflecting on the news that major platforms were ramping up their use of automated content screening tools in the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic
    Robert Gorwa, 2020
    Centre for International Governance Innovation
  • Regulating Platforms Softly
    An essay reflecting on informal and co-regulatory models for platform regulation; part of essay collection on 'Models for Platform Governance'
    Robert Gorwa, 2019
    Centre for International Governance Innovation
  • Big Tech Hits the Diplomatic Circuit
    Summary of book chapter looking at the growing and unique role played by Microsoft in international digital policy - and their unique 'diplomatic' lobbying strategy
    Robert Gorwa and Anton Peez, 2019
    Berlin Policy Journal
  • What Policymakers Can Do For Europe's Digital Media Ecosystem
    Summary of RISJ report looking at sustainable media policy suggestions for the von Der Leyen Commission
    Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, Madeleine de Cock Buning, and Robert Gorwa, 2019
    The Conversation
  • The Shifting Definition of Platform Governance
    Invited contribution with some general reflections on how to understand and define 'platform governance' - both as a field of research and as a terrain of political struggle
    Robert Gorwa, 2019
    Centre for International Governance Innovation
  • How Mark Zuckerberg Could Save Facebook From Itself
    Op-ed with summary takeaways from RISJ 'Glasnost' report looking at the slow increase in Facebook's community standards-related transparency in 2018-2019
    Robert Gorwa and Danae Metaxa, 2019
    WIRED
  • Facebook's Decency Conundrum
    Print mag piece with some thoughts on the challenges of moderating borderline content (like 'art')
    Robert Gorwa, 2018
    WIRED
  • Twitter has a Bot Problem, and Wikipedia Might Have the Solution
    Op-ed looking at Wikipedia's bot classification and reporting system, and comparing that to Twitter's decision to privilige developer access over content moderation
    Robert Gorwa, 2017
    Quartz
  • Tinder Nightmares
    Op-ed applying some reflections from our Policy & Internet article on bots to an interesting (and potentially problematic) use of automated Tinder bots for electioneering in the UK
    Robert Gorwa and Douglas Guilbeault, 2017
    WIRED
  • Quantum Leap
    Essay discussing developments in quantum computing (and quantum resistant cryptography), and its potential implications for geopolitics
    Taylor Owen and Robert Gorwa, 2016
    Foreign Affairs