Democracy, technology, and information societies

Abstract

Computer systems, like other technologies, are socio-technical systems; they are networks of artifacts together with social practices, social relationships, social institutions and values. Viewing computer systems in this way helps to understand, at a deep level, how democracy can be affected by, and can affect, the design of computer systems. In this paper I will revisit my earlier work on the connections between the Internet and democracy. I will describe how my thinking about technology and ethics has changed and I will present a new set of claims about the ways in which computer systems are and are not related to democracy and democratic practices. © 2007 International Federation for Information Processing.