News and Research articles on Elections

Avatarobots and the crisis of democracy: From bot armies to metaverse swarms

Constantin Vică, University of Bucharest
Radu Uszkai, University of Bucharest
Alexandru Dancu, University of Bucharest; National University of Physical Education and Sport, Bucharest
Cristina Voinea, University of Oxford
PUBLISHED ON: 24 Sep 2026 DOI: 10.14763/2026.3.2118

Avatarobots, synthetic majorities and the struggle for democratic agency in the metaverse.

Discussing three factors that characterise the activities of political campaigners, this article demonstrates variations in who is using data in campaigns, what the sources of campaign data are, and how data informs communication.

The regulation of online political micro-targeting in Europe

Tom Dobber, University of Amsterdam
Ronan Ó Fathaigh, University of Amsterdam
Frederik J. Zuiderveen Borgesius, Radboud University
PUBLISHED ON: 31 Dec 2019 DOI: 10.14763/2019.4.1440

This paper discusses how online political micro-targeting is regulated in Europe, from the perspective of data protection law, freedom of expression, and political advertising rules.

Focusing on whether data-intensive technologies used in political campaigning are accurate and effective misses the point about their larger role in politics. This piece briefly addresses the popular question of “Does it work?” and suggests a series of questions and provocations that aim to more holistically capture the extent of tech-led disruption in a time of creeping voter surveillance.