Theorizing Truth to Enhance Trustworthiness – 2nd Working Paper available!

We are proud to announce the publication of our second Working Paper – ‘A Global Charter for Truth: Social Epistemology for the Internet Age’, authored by philosopher Joshua Habgood-Coote. The research has been commissioned by the IYTT to substantiate and develop the democracy promoting policy proposals that came out from our international youth conference in November 2020.

The 2020 youth conference addressed what the participants phrased “a truth crisis”, by proposing a Global Charter for Truth entailing a reformation of social media, increased protection of data ownership, and immunity for journalists. Joshua Habgood-Coote conceptualizes the very problem of a “truth crisis” in terms of social epistemology and poses the question: “How can media in democratic society help or hinder us to reach the knowledge we need – as individuals, and as a community?” Following that, Joshua theorizes ways in which a productive infrastructure of media can be promoted. An overview of the research field and practices are then directed back towards a theorizing dialogue with the 2020 youth conference proposal.

Joshua has done a stunning job combining learned theorizing of the truth concept, with a curious and dedicated dialogue with our youth’s policy proposal for a global truth charter. His seminal scholarly work on the paper has been carried out in close collaboration with our youth, and is an invaluable source for inspiration and substantiation to them when currently writing a policy brief provisionally entitled ‘Truth keeping through journalistic immunity’. This and an IYTT policy brief provisionally entitled ‘Addressing democratic disenchantment through Community Assemblies. A complementary approach to representative democracy’ will be presented on July 7, as part of the online event Almedalen Democracy Summit, which we organize in collaboration with Athens Democracy Forum, International IDEA, and the Stockholm Philanthropy Symposium.

Joshua Habgood-Coote is a research fellow in the School of Philosophy, Religion and History of Science at the University of Leeds and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Department of Philosophy at the University of Bristol. He completed a PhD in Philosophy from the University of St Andrews and the University of Stirling in 2017. He works in epistemology, philosophy of language, and the philosophy of technology, has written academic papers on knowledge-how, collective inquiry, and how to think about misinformation. He has also published articles in The Guardian, Real Life, and Aeon.