Dr. Seeta Gangadharan

Biography

Seeta Peña Gangadharan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Media and Communications at the London School of Economics and Political Science, where she also serves as the Deputy Head of Research. Her work focuses on issues of inclusion, exclusion, and marginalization in relation to democracy, social justice, and technological governance. She co-leads projects such as 'Data Bodies', which examines the impact of data collection and data-driven technologies on marginalized communities in the United States. Additionally, she explores the implications of such technologies within European civil society. Gangadharan has held positions as a visiting scholar at the School of Media Studies at The New School and as an Affiliated Fellow at Yale Law School’s Information Society Project. Her research has received support from various funding bodies, including the Digital Trust Foundation and the Ford Foundation. Gangadharan's expertise involves investigating how statistical and automated systems affect governance and exacerbate inequalities faced by marginalized communities. She emphasizes the importance of context and reflexivity in the development of new technologies and critiques ethical frameworks aimed at combating bias in algorithmic systems. She has an ongoing interest in civil society, public participation, and technology policy, highlighted by her doctoral research at Stanford University, which focused on the politics of communication in U.S. Federal Communications Commission policymaking.

Research Interests