Submission to The Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters (JSCEM)

We welcome the opportunity to make a submission to the JSCEM on civics education, engagement, and participation in Australia. We are Chief Investigators of the Australian Research Council funded project, Addressing Misinformation with Media Literacy through Cultural Institutions and we have carried out a series of media literacy research projects over the past decade. We are making this submission because we believe our current and recent media literacy research projects can be used to inform this Inquiry. Disinformation is a serious threat to all societies because it can be used to undermine democratic institutions and processes (such as elections) by preventing people from making informed decisions. Disinformation can also polarise societies by pitting communities against each other. Citizens need to be media literate to identify reliable information, avoid disinformation and create high quality information. For this reason, our submission draws on our research to examine the role of media literacy in supporting civic participation and enabling a functioning democracy.