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Lecture description: The utilization of data from social media platforms, digital communication logs, administrative records, or sensor data to study the structure and dynamics of human behavior constitutes the foundation of computational social science. The increasing prevalence of algorithmic optimization, particularly in AI-driven systems, is profoundly impacting the manner in which we communicate, organize, and make decisions as individuals and as a society. Concurrently, these systems serve to reflect—and frequently reinforce—existing social biases, power relations, and institutional structures. In order to reveal the negative impact of data on fundamental rights, democracy, and the rule of law, interdisciplinary approaches are needed involving scholars and methods ranging from computer science, social sciences to legal scholars and philosophers.

Bio: Professor Jürgen Pfeffer is Full Professor of Computational Social Science at the School of Social Sciences and Technology at the Technical University of Munich. Prior to 2016, Professor Pfeffer held the position of Assistant Research Professor of Societal Computing at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, USA. In 2010, he was awarded a Doctorate in Business Informatics from Technical University of Vienna. His research is centered on the analysis of large and dynamic social, political, and economic systems, as well as the methodological, algorithmic and theoretical challenges that arise from these analyses. Pfeffer's research is situated at the intersection of the social and computer sciences.

Please note: As seating is limited, please contact Ms. Sarah Heider (sheider@uni-bremen.de) for registration.