Collaboratory Against Hate: Research and Action Center

We anticipate that future conferences will organized in collaboration with the Collaboratory Against Hate: Research and Action Center of the University of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University.

The Problem

Extremist hate groups have radically changed the way they operate and mobilize people to advance their agendas. The internet and social media not only provide groups with a vast arena for recruitment, but also places where they can hide.  These platforms have made the distribution, mobilization and spread of online hate much harder to monitor and prosecute. It’s also more difficult to decipher the extent to which virtual communities of hate are simply reinforcing each other or being pushed by organized extremist organizations. That’s created challenges for researchers and law enforcement who are trying to understand how these groups work and how to intervene.

Pitt + CMU

The center brings together the collective expertise from all relevant disciplines at the University of Pittsburgh, Carnegie Mellon University and regional partners— including computer science, data science, social sciences, psychology, psychiatry and the law — as we seek to better understand and combat hatred based on race, ethnicity, religion, gender identity, sexual orientation and other prejudices.  The center aims to develop effective interventions to inhibit every stage in the creation and growth of extremist hate, as well as interventions to minimize its impacts. Researchers study how extremism originates and circulates, how it shapes extremist views and fosters polarization in society, and how it provokes harmful and illegal acts, with a focus on its effects on minoritized and marginalized groups in society.

Mission

The Collaboratory Against Hate aspires to develop and support innovative multidisciplinary, interdisciplinary, and cross-university research aimed at understanding how extremist hate is generated, how it circulates in online and real-life spaces, and how it polarizes society and provokes harmful and illegal acts, especially toward communities of color and other minoritized groups. We seek to develop effective interventions to inhibit every stage in the creation and growth of extremist hate groups and to minimize their destructive consequences.