David L. Sloss 76F’s New Book Examines Misinformation Campaigns on Twitter and Beyond

At Hampshire, David Sloss studied a combination of philosophy, political theory, and religion, and has spent his career at the forefront of research in legal affairs. “Hampshire inspired my love of learning and my commitment to a lifetime of intellectual inquiry,” he says. A teacher of law since 1999, Sloss has served as a litigation associate, clerked for a judge in the U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit, San Francisco, and worked for the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. 

Sloss helped draft and negotiate three major arms-control treaties and was a key contributor to work being done on issues of nuclear proliferation. “My Hampshire education was great preparation for my government career,” he says, “which was in turn great preparation for my current career as a law professor.” 

His expertise in international law is evident in Tyrants on Twitter, which was published in April. The book provides a detailed analysis of how Chinese and Russian agents weaponize Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube — among other social media platforms — for the purpose of subverting the liberal international order. 

Sloss examines everything from Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election to China's utilization of global media operations to meddle in Western democracies. He concludes the work by offering up a solution. Drawing on his academic expertise in constitutional law, Sloss proposes practical legislative answers to fight back against disinformation campaigns that threaten to undermine our democracy.

Sloss is the author of Is the International Legal Order Unraveling? (2022) and The Death of Treaty Supremacy: An Invisible Constitutional Change (2016). He is a coeditor of International Law in the U.S. Supreme Court: Continuity and Change (2011) and editor of The Role of Domestic Courts in Treaty Enforcement: A Comparative Study (2009).