Despite the implications upon national security and stability, very little is known about how online sectarian narratives in Lebanon spread when triggered against a background of crises at the political and social levels. In this project, we address the following overarching research question: what tools are needed, and under which unifying framework using qualitative and quantitative elements, can enable the understanding, as well as the quantification, of the manifestations of moral panic discourse in the social media sphere? and how can elements from disparate perspectives and research disciplines be combined to create a framework for security in the making?  To this end, this project explores the potential and limitations of content analytics, data visualizations, and hate speech detection using agentic AI, as critical methods for research on (in)security.

In this project, and together with a consortium of community-based experts and academics, we aim to develop, deploy, and evaluate, a community-driven, evidence-based framework for investigating the obstacles facing the implementation of anti-corruption and accountability mechanisms, and for developing and proposing preventive and corrective measures to break the current political stalemate. In essence, this project is an original interdisciplinary endeavor between the field of political science and computer science via the application of computer analyses and Artificial Intelligence tools (AI) to generate recommendations for better transparency, accountability and reforms in Lebanon.

Urban Analytica is a community-led knowledge producer dedicated to promoting a democratic and modern social order in the region. By leveraging qualitative and quantitative, evidence-based approaches, we advocate and act in accordance with secular and civil society values. Our interdisciplinary work integrates insights and technologies from social and political sciences, data science, artificial intelligence, graph analytics, and data visualization.