Tech & Society: “The Great Overhaul: Reinventing Politics & Media for the Digital Age”
Aspen Institute España and Fundación Telefónica held the second session of the Tech & Society Program on September 22nd with a debate on “Media and technology” with Nancy Scola, journalist and writer specialized in technology and society and former head of technology at Político magazine. The session was moderated by José Ignacio Torreblanca, PhD in Political Sciences from Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Professor of Political Science at the National University of Distance Education (UNED) in Madrid and Head of the Madrid Office and Principal Investigator at European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR).
In the last fifteen years, the tremendous power of digital technologies — chief among them social media — has completely changed how the two core social pillars of politics and media are practiced. Politicians are learning to contend with near constant scrutiny while scrambling to make the most of global distribution channels. Journalists, meanwhile, are attempting to determine how to adapt their field to a world dominated by companies like Facebook, Google, and Amazon while trying to figure out how to pull back the curtain on how those organizations work. How, exactly, are those professions adapting? And how should they adapt?
Speaker
Nancy Scola is a veteran journalist and magazine writer whose work on the intersections of technology and society is published by the Atlantic, Washingtonian, New York, Reuters, POLITICO Magazine, and many other publications. She has served as both a senior technology reporter at POLITICO and a staffer writer at the Washington Post. Based in Washington, D.C., she is an adjunct professor in journalism and media studies at Georgetown University. Before coming to journalism, Nancy worked in the United States Congress, focused on government oversight. She holds a B.A. in anthropology and Africana studies from the George Washington University, as well as a master’s degree in anthropology from Boston University. She was born and raised in New Jersey.
Moderator
José Ignacio Torreblanca, PhD in Political Science from Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Professor of Political Science at the National University of Distance Education (UNED) in Madrid and Head of the Madrid Office and Principal Investigator at European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR). In addition, he is a columnist for the daily El Mundo and a contributor to Radio Nacional de España (RNE). Previously, from 2016 to 2018, he was editor in chief of the Spanish daily El País. In 2015, he was awarded with the Salvador de Madariaga Prize for Journalism. He has published “La soberanía digital de Europa” (Catarata, 2020, co-editor), “Asaltar los cielos: Podemos ola política después de la crisis” (Debate, 2015), “¿Quién Gobierna en Europa?” (Catarata, 2014) and “La fragmentación del poder europeo” (Icaria 2011). He has been researcher at Real Instituto Elcano and at the European University Institute in Florence, fellow of the Fulbright Program and Professor at the Elliot School of International Affairs at the George Washington University in Washington D.C.
V Edition of the Tech & Society Program
Aspen Institute España and Fundación Telefónica launched the V Edition of the Tech & Society Program. The Program, in its fifth edition, will once again hold debates, conferences and the Socrates Seminar, which will take place at La Granja de San Ildefonso (Segovia) and will be sponsored by Google.
