Net neutrality regulation and the participatory condition

Abstract

Across the globe, net neutrality policy consultations have sought the input of an engaged networked public by recursively mobilising the very technology of the internet itself as a kind of policy participation. This paper examines such cases, where regulators in the United States, Canada, India, and the European Union intended to more accurately represent public interest perspectives. However, as I argue, appeals to the participatory culture of the internet risk reifying participation itself while ignoring systemic inequalities that structure the concept of networked publics according to the exclusionary norms of internet discourse.