Platform Politics and Content Moderation
How do platforms intervene in the world around us? What kinds of politics do they enact? And most importantly - how do we ensure they are the politics we want?
The governance role of technology companies has been a running theme of my work in the past decade. I was one of the conveners of the Santa Clara Principles on Content Moderation, and am on the advisory board for OnlineCensorship.org, a project designed to study and advocate for transparency around content moderation when tech companies would not divulge information about their operations publicly.
Here are a few articles I've published in this space:
Suzor, N.P, West, S.M., Quodling, A., and York, J. (2019). What Do We Mean When We Talk About Transparency? Toward Meaningful Transparency in Content Moderation. International Journal of Communication 13, 1526-1543. https://ijoc.org/index.php/ijoc/article/view/9736/2610.
West, S.M. (2018) Censored, Suspended, Shadowbanned: Researching User Experiences of Content Moderation on Social Media Platforms, New Media & Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444818773059.
(Won best student paper, Media Industry Studies group at ICA)
Suzor, N., Van Geelen, T., and West, S.M. (2018) Evaluating the legitimacy of platform
governance: a review of research and a shared research agenda, International Communication Gazette. https://doi-org.libproxy2.usc.edu/10.1177/1748048518757142
West, S.M. (2017). Data Capitalism: Redefining the Logics of Surveillance and Privacy,
Business and Society. https://doi.org/10.1177/0007650317718185
West, S.M. (2017). Raging Against the Machine: Collective Action on Social Media Platforms, Media and Communication, 5(3). http://dx.doi.org/10.17645/mac.v5i3.989
West, S.M. (2017). Searching for the Public in Internet Governance: An Examination of
Infrastructures of Participation at NETmundial, Policy & Internet. http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/poi3.143.
West, S.M. (2014). Redefining Digital Diplomacy: Modeling Business Diplomacy by Internet Companies in China. Hague Journal of Diplomacy, 9(4): 334-355.
https://doi.org/10.1163/1871191X-12341295.