The Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy’s new media literacy project DE.CO.DE (Decode, Co Create, Debate) has launched. After opening applications to a series of spring workshops on disinformation and how to respond to it, the Albert Hirschman Centre on Democracy welcomed close to forty young participants from the Lake Geneva region for the first two sessions this past weekend. The workshops were led by Institute alumnus and journalist Joseph Roche.

Held on 13 and 14 March, the opening sessions, Identifying Disinformation Campaigns and Troll Farms and the Industrialization of Manipulation, introduced participants to the dynamics through which misleading narratives are produced, coordinated, and amplified online. Through discussion and collective analysis, participants examined how organized networks and digital platforms contribute to the large-scale circulation of manipulative content, while reflecting on the broader implications for democratic debate.
The workshop series will continue in the coming months with further sessions exploring emerging forms of digital manipulation and the transformation of online information environments. Upcoming workshops include Deepfakes, Social Media, and Synthetic Reality (15 May), Detecting and Responding to Deepfakes (16 May), and Alternative Realities and Fragmented Information Spaces (12 June).

Alongside the workshops, participants will collaborate on the creation of a multimedia guide aimed at helping young audiences identify and respond to disinformation online. By bringing together research, journalism, and youth participation, the DE.CO.DE project seeks to strengthen media literacy and encourage critical engagement with the digital information ecosystems that shape contemporary public life.