The fifth student workshop on “Strengthening Democratic Values; Information Verification in Turkish-American Relations” was held at Giresun University between May 16-18, 2024 within the scope of the “Make Information True Again” (MITA) project organized by the Council on International Relations Association, the US Embassy and the Global Academy.
The workshop was attended by 23 undergraduate and graduate students studying in the Department of International Relations at Giresun University. On the first day of the workshop, the participants were informed about the activities planned to be carried out within the scope of the workshop, and then the experts gave presentations on “The Post-Truth Era: Facts and Half-Truths”, “Infodemic and Types of Information Irregularities” and “Fact Checking: Methodology and Applications”.
On the second day of the workshop, academics gave seminars in the morning on “Psychological Warfare and Cognitive Warfare in the 21st Century”, “Disinformation, Misinformation and Fake News in Foreign Policy and UA Relations in the Age of Beyond Reality”, and “Turkey-US-NATO Relations”. In the afternoon part of the workshop, the conference titled “Turkey’s Transatlantic Relations in the Focus of Global Transformation” was facilitated by Prof. Dr. Yalçın Sarıkaya (Giresun University) with the participation of Prof. Dr. Mustafa Aydın (Kadir Has University), Prof. Dr. Serhat Güvenç (Kadir Has University), Prof. Dr. Özgün Erler Bayır (Istanbul University) and Prof. Dr. Kaan Ataç (Mersin University). During the two-hour-long conference, the participants were provided with historical and current information on Turkish-American relations, made predictions for the future of relations, and emphasized on misconceptions through fact-checking methods. After the question and answer session, the second day of the workshop was completed.
On the third and final day of the workshop, participants played online games to support the fight against disinformation. Afterwards, the experts of the activity talked about examples of disinformation frequently encountered on social media platforms in recent times, especially the Russia-Ukraine War, and conducted group work and practices that enabled the participants to fact-check these news from different platforms. The three-day workshop ended with a certificate ceremony.
