The 6th International Conference on Communication and Applied Technologies (ICOMTA’26), to be held in João Pessoa, Brazil, will feature two special issues in two of the most important journals in the field. The first, dedicated to papers in English, is titled “Transformations of Public Agendas in Latin America and the Iberian Peninsula: Political Communication, Populism, and the Quality of Democracy.” This special issue will select papers that, from an interdisciplinary perspective and with an Ibero-American scope, address changes in public agendas in the context of the digitalization of political communication, the rise of populist discourse, and the fragmentation of the public sphere, among other topics.
This special issue is a collaborative initiative led by Paulo Carlos López (Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, Spain), together with Daniel Barredo Ibáñez (University of Seville, Spain), Raquel Recuero (Universidade Federal de Pelotas, Brazil), and Ángela Alonso (Universidade de São Paulo, Brazil). It will be published in Social Sciences & Humanities Open, an Elsevier journal indexed in Scopus (Q1).
Second special issue: papers in Spanish on polarization, populism, and post-truth
“At ICOMTA, we promote—and this is part of our identity—the interaction between academic communities in the Global North and the Global South, especially between Spain and Latin America, while also incorporating researchers from other traditions and contexts,” says Daniel Barredo Ibáñez (University of Seville), who leads, together with Holli A. Semetko (Emory University, United States) and Agnieszka Hess (Jagiellonian University, Poland), the special issue titled “Political Communication in Times of Polarization, Populism, and Post-Truth.”
This special issue will examine the key role of interactive media and the potential of social media to shape and mis-shape public opinion, as well as identify challenges, approaches, and methodologies in the study of contemporary public opinion. “This special issue emerges at a critical moment for communication and applied technologies, with the rise of far-right political movements that, through disinformation and by undermining public opinion, seek to influence electoral processes in order to impose regressive agendas,” Barredo explains. The special issue will be published in Palabra Clave (Scopus, Q2), one of the most relevant journals in the Ibero-American field.
How to participate
Authors interested in submitting their work for these special issues should follow these steps:
1. Submit an abstract
Submit an abstract of the article (a full conference paper is not required) through the following link:
👉 https://icomta.net/envio-de-abstracts/
2. Selection process
After peer review and an evaluation of the quality and relevance of the abstracts, the editorial committee will select the most suitable proposals for both special issues. Authors of accepted abstracts will be contacted directly by the editors and guided through the submission of the full paper via the journal platform, where the extended version will undergo a new round of peer review.
For more information about the themes of the special issues:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/social-sciences-and-humanities-open/about/call-for-papers
https://palabraclave.unisabana.edu.co/index.php/palabraclave/announcement/view/305
For more information about ICOMTA’26 in Brazil:
👉 https://icomta.me/
ICOMTA'26 