In recent years, journalists and scholars have observed a so-called “right turn” in Silicon Valley. In fact, this “turn” is neither an anomaly, nor a recent development, argues Becca Lewis, an expert on disinformation and far-right digital media.
In this talk, recorded at BESI on April 24, 2025, Lewis recounts how right-wing politics came to Silicon Valley decades before Elon Musk began running DOGE. She focuses on a group of conservative activists who brought their ideas to bear on Silicon Valley and its digital technologies in the 1980s and 1990s. Operating within a loose network of think tanks and media publications, these activists embraced the world of high technology as a space for building right-wing power and a vehicle for restoring older social orders.
Ultimately, she shows how these groups’ efforts brought conservatism into the Information Age — and how they enlisted Silicon Valley in the broader right-wing political project.
