Technology, Democracy, & the Rule of Law

How are technologies being misused to undermine democratic processes? Where might we have leverage to steer things back on course? What can we expect to see over the next few years, and what can we do about it?

Please join us for a fireside chat about how technology and democracy both support and undermine each other. Moderated by Sarah Newman.

Event Details

• Date & Time: Monday, November 10, 2025 @ 4:00–5:00 PM
• Location: Berkman Klein Center, 1557 Massachusetts Avenue, 5th Floor
• In-person is open to Harvard ID holders. The online event is public.

Registration form

Speakers

Cindy Cohn

Cindy Cohn is the Executive Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. From 2000-2015 she served as EFF’s Legal Director as well as its General Counsel. Ms. Cohn first became involved with EFF in 1993, when EFF asked her to serve as the outside lead attorney in Bernstein v. Dept. of Justice, the successful First Amendment challenge to the U.S. export restrictions on cryptography.

Ms. Cohn has been named to TheNonProfitTimes 2020 Power & Influence TOP 50 list, honoring 2020’s movers and shakers. In 2018, Forbes included Ms. Cohn as one of America’s Top 50 Women in Tech. The National Law Journal named Ms. Cohn one of 100 most influential lawyers in America in 2013, noting: “[I]f Big Brother is watching, he better look out for Cindy Cohn.” She was also named in 2006 for “rushing to the barricades wherever freedom and civil liberties are at stake online.” In 2007 the National Law Journal named her one of the 50 most influential women lawyers in America. In 2010 the Intellectual Property Section of the State Bar of California awarded her its Intellectual Property Vanguard Award and in 2012 the Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists awarded her the James Madison Freedom of Information Award.

Larry Schwartztol

Larry Schwartztol is Professor of Practice at Harvard Law School, where he teaches, writes, and advocates on democracy and voting rights, civil rights, anti-discrimination law, and federal civil procedure. He is also the faculty director of the Democracy and Rule of Law Clinic.

Before joining the faculty at HLS, Schwartztol served in the Biden Administration as Associate White House Counsel and Special Assistant to the President, where he was part of a team within Counsel’s Office focused on Administration policies to advance racial justice and equity. In that role, he was the point person within Counsel’s Office on issues relating to voting rights and democracy.

Prior to serving in the Biden Administration, Schwartztol spent 15 years as a litigator, advocate, and researcher on issues relating to democracy and racial justice. From 2017 to 2021, he was counsel at Protect Democracy, where he managed legal and policy advocacy on democracy reform and voting rights. Before that, he served as the inaugural Executive Director of the Criminal Justice Policy Program at Harvard Law School, a research and advocacy center that focused on criminal justice reform. Schwartztol also served as a staff attorney in the ACLU’s Racial Justice Program, where he led complex litigation on a broad range of civil rights issues. He also spent a year as a Liman Fellow in the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law. Schwartztol clerked for Judge Harry T. Edwards of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

Schwartztol received his J.D. from Yale Law School and his B.A. from the University of Chicago.