Panel: The Fourth Estate in a Post-Truth World

As part of the conference “What’s Going On: Reflections on Truth, Politics, Democracy and Language,” Deutsches Haus at NYU presents a panel discussion featuring the New Yorker staff writer and Columbia Journalism School professor Jelani Cobb, and the Tageszeitung’s (TAZ’s) Dorothea Hahn, which will be moderated by Professor Marcia Pally.

Though fake news is not a new phenomenon, it has taken on a new dimension under the Trump administration with the broadened reach of digitization and social media proliferation. This panel discussion featuring distinguished journalists from the U.S. and Germany will reflect on what steps need to be taken, both on a domestic as well as on an international level, to hold Donald Trump and his administration (as well as populist movements in Europe) accountable for their actions. Our panelists will also discuss the erosion of public trust in the media and what strategies journalists can pursue to maintain or restore credibility in a post-truth world; how to counteract the amplification of misinformation campaigns and fake news, and whether/how journalism and media companies need to evolve from here in order to ensure that fact prevails over fiction.