We are happy to announce the publication of a new PhD paper by our lab member, Vasilisa Kuznetsova, titled “All talk, no rules: Content moderation practices and discursive strategies in platform governance of climate misinformation.”

As social media platforms become central environments for public discourse on climate change, they also serve as primary vectors for the circulation and visibility of climate misinformation. In this timely and critical study, Kuznetsova investigates how tech giants: Meta, YouTube, TikTok, and X/Twitter, govern this pressing issue, and how they use discursive strategies to negotiate their responsibility.

Through a qualitative analysis of 95 policy documents and public communications, the research reveals a stark contrast between platforms’ public commitments and their formal rules. Climate misinformation is rarely treated as a distinct, high-priority category. Instead, these tech giants rely heavily on “soft” interventions like labeling and algorithmic demotion, largely avoiding outright content removal.

Furthermore, the paper identifies three cross-platform strategies used to legitimize this approach: increasing the good while decreasing the bad, empowering others, and authorizing content creators. By shifting governance labor onto users, platforms cultivate a narrative of benevolence and replace enforceable duties with performative evidence of care. Ultimately, the study exposes the profound limits of platform self-governance and highlights the urgent need for external oversight.

Read the full paper here:

Kuznetsova, V. (2026). All talk, no rules: Content moderation practices and discursive strategies in platform governance of climate misinformation. Platforms & Society, 3. https://doi.org/10.1177/29768624261499168