Research Foci
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Digital Technologies in Society
In this research focus, the connection between digitalization, participation and inequality is to be researched, the use of digital technologies for participation opportunities is to be tested and interventions against new inequalities are to be made. To this end, perspectives from business informatics, design research and computer science will be brought together.
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Digital Markets and Public Spheres on Platforms
In recent years, markets and publics have emerged on digital platforms, which are investigated in the four research groups of the focus area. Normatively, these platforms are in tension between public good orientation and economic imperatives. For their investigation, the perspectives of communication science, political science, economics, and computer science are brought together.
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Organizing Knowledge
Within this research focus we deal with questions about the workplace, the education system, and science. Above all we examine questions of openness and exclusion in the processing and organization of data and knowledge. In doing so, we draw on perspectives from computer science, business informatics, sociology, and innovation research.
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Digital Infrastructures in Democracy
This research focus examines the development of digital infrastructures and the resulting structural change in society. Special attention is given to tensions between security and freedom from the perspectives of law, sociology, computer science, and political science.
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Weizenbaum Digital Science Center
With the new Weizenbaum Digital Science Center, the Weizenbaum Institute establishes scientific offerings that create research, networking, orientation, and infrastructure services for interdisciplinary digitalization research and strengthen the coherence of research at the Weizenbaum Institute.
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Events
09/21/2026 - 09/22/2026
Weizenbaum-Institut, Hardenbergstraße 32, 10623 Berlin
Symposium
DigiSem 2026 | Balancing Digital Safety between Risks, Rights, and Regulation
The Bavarian Research Institute for Digital Transformation (bidt), the Center for Advanced Internet Studies (CAIS), Leibniz Institute for Media Research – Hans Bredow Institute (HBI) and the Weizenbaum Institute (WI) invite doctoral and postdoctoral researchers to present their work at the joint…
09/30/2026 - 10/02/2026
Weizenbaum-Institut,
Hardenbergstraße 32,
10623 Berlin
Symposium
5. Data Donation Symposium
Wie können Datenspenden unabhängige Forschung ermöglichen, wenn Plattformkonzerne den Zugang zu ihren Daten zunehmend einschränken? Darüber diskutieren Am 1. und 2. Oktober diskutieren internationale Expert:innen beim 5. Data Donation Symposium über aktuelle Entwicklungen und Methoden.
09/30/2026
05:00 PM - 06:30 PM | TU Berlin, Fraunhoferstr. 33–36, Room: FH 804
Talk
The City and the Platform: A Dialogical Keynote
As the ubiquity of digital media has created new informational layer to urban spaces and shifted how urban residents interact, a nascent body of research has begun inquiring into the relationship between cities and platforms.
09/30/2026
07:00 PM -
08:30 PM
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Kinosaal der Rotor Film GmbH,
August-Bebel-Str. 26-53/Haus 4, 14482 Potsdam
Weizenbaum Debate
Weizenbaum Debate – How To Debate: Zusammenhalt stärken statt Gräben vertiefen
Bei der diesjährigen Weizenbaum Debate wollen wir den Blick auf das richten, was uns verbindet, und gemeinsame Grundlagen für eine konstruktive Debatte schaffen. Was hält uns zusammen – und wie können wir das Miteinander stärken?
10/08/2026
07:00 PM -
08:30 PM
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Weizenbaum-Institut,
Hardenbergstraße 32,
10623 Berlin
Panel Discussion
Symposium
Souveränität im Netz – Wie eine europäische Webdateninfrastruktur Freiheit, Wirtschaft und Demokratie stärkt
Im Rahmen des Open Search Symposiums 2026 diskutieren Expertinnen und Experten aus Politik, Gesellschaft und Wissenschaft über Chancen und Herausforderungen für Europas Unabhängigkeit im Netz.
10/11/2026
Teilnahme via Livestream um 9:33 und 14:33 Uhr
Talk
Einfach Wissen: Wie machen soziale Medien uns glücklich - oder eben nicht?
Was macht Social Media mit unserem Wohlbefinden? Ein Gespräch mit Dr. Annika Baumann und Jessica Wiener von rbb24.
10/30/2026
10:00 AM - 02:00 PM | Weizenbaum-Institut, Hardenbergstraße 32, 10623 Berlin
Workshop
Was wird aus digitalen Prototypen der Zivilgesellschaft?
Dritter Workshop über Discontinued Civic Tech in Kooperation zwischen Civic Data Lab und dem Weizenbaum-Institut.
11/17/2026
06:00 PM - 07:30 PM | Weizenbaum-Institut | Hardenbergstraße 32 | 10623 Berlin
Book Presentation
Panel Discussion
Sarah Sharma: Insufferable Tools. Feminism Against Big Tech
Book Talk and Panel Discussion as part of the anniversary “60 years of ELIZA, 50 years of computer criticism"
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