October 16 2020
Tamar Mitts is an Assistant Professor of International and Public Affairs and a member of the Data Science Institute and the Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies at Columbia University. Her research addresses emerging challenges at the intersection of technology and conflict.
Professor Mitts’s work focuses on several broad questions: (a) What role does social media play during conflict and civil war? (b) How do violent and nonviolent movements use the internet to advance their cause? and (c) In what ways can media be manipulated to shape public opinion? Mitts’s research draws on innovative data collection techniques and creative research designs that leverage the wealth of information available in digital media platforms. Her articles have been published in leading journals, including the American Political Science Review, International Organization, the Journal of Politics, Perspectives on Politics, and the Journal of Economic Perspectives, among other outlets. Her research has been cited in the Washington Post, Boston Globe, Fortune Magazine, Vox, War on the Rocks, and Foreign Policy.
Mitts is currently working on a new book, Moderating Extremism: The Challenge of Combating Online Harms, which explains why militant organizations flourish online despite global efforts to clamp down on harmful content on social media platforms.
Mitts holds an M.A., M.Phil., and Ph.D. in political science from Columbia University and a B.A. in politics from New York University.
Principal Articles
Tamar Mitts, “Cross-Platform Reactions to the Post-January 6 Deplatforming.” Journal of Quantitative Description: Digital Media 3 (March 2023) (with Cody Buntain, Martin Innes, and Jacob Shapiro)
Guy Grossman, Yotam Margarita, and Tamar Mitts, “How the Ultrarich Use Media Ownership as a Political Investment,” The Journal of Politics 84, no. 4 (October 2022).
Tamar Mitts, “Political Coalitions and Social Media: Evidence from Pakistan.” Perspectives on Politics (August 2022): 1-20 (with Asfandyar Mir and Paul Staniland).
Tamar Mitts, Gregoire Phillips, and Barbara F. Walter, “Studying the Impact of ISIS Propaganda Campaigns,” The Journal of Politics 84, no. 2 (April 2022).
Devorah Manekin and Tamar Mitts, “Effective for Whom? Ethnic Identity and Nonviolent Resistance,” American Political Science Review 116, no. 1 (September 2021).
Tamar Mitts, “Countering Violent Extremism and Radical Rhetoric,” International Organization 76, no. 1 (May 2021).
Tamar Mitts, “Terrorism and the Rise of Right-Wing Content in Israeli Books,” International Organization 73, no. 1 (Winter 2019).
Devorah Manekin, Guy Grossman, and Tamar Mitts, “Contested Ground: Disentangling Material and Symbolic Attachment to Disputed Territory,” Political Science Research and Methods 7, no. 4 (October 2019).
Tamar Mitts, “From Isolation to Radicalization: Anti-Muslim Hostility and Support for ISIS in the West,” American Political Science Review 113, no. 1 (February 2019).
Tamar Mitts et al., “Can War Foster Cooperation?,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 30, no. 3 (Summer 2016).
Tamar Mitts, “Countering Violent Extremism and Radical Rhetoric,” International Organization (2021): 1-22.
Book Chapters
Tamar Mitts and Jack Snyder, “Regulating the Marketplace of Ideas,” in Jack Snyder, ed., Human Rights for Pragmatists (Princeton City, NY: Princeton University Press, 2022).
Other Articles, Testimony and Reports
Tamar Mitts, “Media Ownership as a Political Investment.” With Guy Grossman and Yotam Margalit. Journal of Politics Blog, (August 2022).
Tamar Mitts, “Are the Taliban Losing Their Digital Clout?,” VOA News, 28 July 2022.
Tamar Mitts, Nikita Pisharody, and Jacob Shapiro, “Removal of Anti-Vaccine Content Impacts Social Media Discourse,” Proceedings of the Association for Computing Machinery Web Science Conference (26 June 2022).
Tamar Mitts and Jack Snyder, “When Twitter suspends users, their views get more extreme,” The Washington Post Monkey Cage, 16 June 2022.
Tamar Mitts and Devorah Manekin, “Effective for Whom? [in Hebrew],” The Institute for Liberty and Responsibility Blog, Spring 2022.
Tamar Mitts, “ISIS Radicalization, Counter-Extremism, and Visual Propaganda on Social Media,” interview with Michael Bossetta, Social Media and Politics Podcast, 24 October 2021.
