The Western world is in a crisis of democracy - but we learn a lot of our principles from the ways we interact online and the internet is essentially a feudal space that gives absolute power to a few and robs the many of agency. Nathan Schneidersuggests that if we were able to shape a more liquid democracy online, our experience of generative interactions would spill over into the outer world. Has to be worth a try, right? So how do we do it?
As we spend increasing amounts of our time, energy and emotional bandwidth online, so we are increasingly exposed to what passes for democracy online. And then we internalise the inherent autocracy and are at risk of exporting this to the real world. So what can we do to change things? What's democracy for in the first place and how can we experiment with increasing the scope and scale of agency and accountability so that we can build trust in the processes that define our lives.
Nathan Schneider is a
professor of media studies at the University of Colorado Boulder, where he directs the
Media Economies Design Lab and the Masters program in Media and Public Engagement. The book that drew me here is 'Governable Spaces: Democratic Design for online life', - which you can buy as a paper copy, but you can also download for free. He has also written '
Everything for Everyone: The Radical Tradition that is Shaping the Next Economy', '
Thank you Anarchy: Notes from the Occupy Movement' and
God in Proof, the Story of a Search from the Ancients to the Internet. He's edited other books about
crypto and
co-ops, writes numerous
articles and
his blog posts are essential reading. He serves on the boards of
Metagov,
Start.coop, and
Waging Nonviolence. Follow his work on social media at @ntnsndr or at his website