Bridging Policy and Research under the DSA: A Structured Research Agenda for Identifying Systemic Risks

The report addresses the definitional ambiguity of 'systemic risks' in the Digital Services Act (DSA) by proposing a structured research agenda. This framework operationalises risk assessment through six dimensions: severity (scale, scope, and remediability) and likelihood (platform characteristics, historical patterns, and contextual factors). Using asymmetric amplification of political content during elections as a case study, the authors demonstrate how a plurality of observational and experimental methods is necessary to generate the evidence required for regulatory decisions. The report concludes that current data access constraints, including limited API functionality and restrictive Virtual Computing Environments, hinder the ability of researchers to fulfill their legally recognised role under the DSA.

• The Digital Services Act (DSA) leaves the definition of 'systemic risks' deliberately ambiguous, which creates uncertainty for researchers regarding priority gaps and for regulators in implementing diverse empirical findings.
• Researchers have a dual role under the DSA: a 'control function' to reduce platform opacity through data access and an 'agenda-setting function' to uncover risks that platforms may have overlooked.
• The proposed research agenda operationalises the severity of a risk across three dimensions: scale (intensity of impact), scope (breadth of impact across communities or geographies), and remediability (feasibility of correcting negative effects).
• Likelihood of systemic risks is assessed through three complementary dimensions: platform characteristics, historical patterns, and contextual factors.
• Asymmetric amplification—the unequal distribution of political content caused by algorithmic ranking—is associated with risks such as societal polarisation, distorted public perception, and the erosion of democratic discourse.
• No single research method is sufficient to assess systemic risks; a combination of observational approaches (for scale and patterns) and experimental approaches (for causal mechanisms and remediability) is required.
• Current data access via APIs is insufficient for systemic risk assessment, as they frequently lack critical datapoints such as impressions, unique viewers, demographic breakdowns, and internal moderation response times.
• The report notes that data access provided through the Virtual Computing Environment (VCE) was too limited to be used for the intended research purposes of the project.

APA

Katzy-Reinshagen, A., Beyer, J., Saab, B., Barth, S., Hohlfeld, A., Wengeler, M., Oehmig, L., & Degeling, M. (2026). Bridging Policy and Research under the DSA: A Structured Research Agenda for Identifying Systemic Risks. Institute for Strategic Dialogue. https://www.isdglobal.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Bridging-policy-and-research-under-the-DSA.pdf

Chicago

Katzy-Reinshagen, Anna, Jan Beyer, Beatriz Saab, Solveig Barth, Alexander Hohlfeld, Marisa Wengeler, Leonie Oehmig, and Martin Degeling. Bridging Policy and Research under the DSA: A Structured Research Agenda for Identifying Systemic Risks. Institute for Strategic Dialogue, 2026. https://www.isdglobal.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Bridging-policy-and-research-under-the-DSA.pdf.

Wikipedia

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BibTeX

@techreport{katzyreinshagen2026bridging, author = {Katzy-Reinshagen, Anna and Beyer, Jan and Saab, Beatriz and Barth, Solveig and Hohlfeld, Alexander and Wengeler, Marisa and Oehmig, Leonie and Degeling, Martin}, title = {{Bridging Policy and Research under the DSA: A Structured Research Agenda for Identifying Systemic Risks}}, institution = {Institute for Strategic Dialogue}, year = {2026}, url = {https://www.isdglobal.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/Bridging-policy-and-research-under-the-DSA.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }