=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-2781/poster1
|storemode=property
|title=“Algocracy”: The Decline of Representative Democracy (short paper)
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2781/poster1.pdf
|volume=Vol-2781
|authors=Alessandro Fricano
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/ifdad/Fricano20
}}
==“Algocracy”: The Decline of Representative Democracy (short paper)==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-2781/poster1.pdf
“Algocracy”: the decline of representative democracy
Alessandro Fricano
1
PhD student at the University of Molise, CB, Italia
2
Viale delle Alpi 113, 90144 Palermo, Italia
alessandro.fricano1995@gmail.com
Abstract. The contribution aims to analyze the impact of new digital
technologies in democratic processes and public institutions. How do
algorithms affect consent? The answer must be sought in the relationship
between technology and law, between the "real square" and the "virtual square".
Can we speak of overcoming representative democracy? We will try to answer
this question starting from the crisis of the intermediate bodies and the
development of the instruments of direct democracy. The algorithm society
transforms the citizen into a mere consumer. The use of increasingly advanced
digital tools constitutes the implementation of the constitutional principles of
good performance and impartiality of the P.A. How have parliamentary
procedures changed following the Covid 19 pandemic? Another issue concerns
the legal nature of remote voting and its constitutional compatibility. Can we
speak of a constitutional right to the internet? Free Internet access is today the
most advanced tool to concretely implement the principle of equality, reducing
the "digital divide".
Keywords: digital divide, e-Democracy, filter bubble.
1 Introduction: the origins of a pathology
In the era in which the future and the very existence of parliaments are at stake, the
question is to understand whether the overcoming of representative democracy is an
inevitable process or not. Every day, every single user receives miles of information
from the network, many of which significantly influence the formation of public
opinion on matters of public interest. It is a liberal theory already known to
philosophers such as John Stuart Mill and Jeremy Bentham: the “marketplace of ideas
theory”. The more ideas circulate and compete with each other, the more it is possible
to make a selection among them, thus contributing to the formation of a conscious
political will in each citizen. Fake news has always existed, only the means of
propagation and their effectiveness have changed. Although not an unprecedented
phenomenon, the absolute speed of circulation (and sharing) of news on the web and
in social media is an element of novelty. The problem lies in the political use of fake
news by leaders as a tool to distort public opinion. This inevitably ends up altering the
functioning of the constitutional bodies [1]. New scenarios open up to the unresolved
Copyright © 2020 for this paper by its authors. Use permitted under Creative
Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
2
problems of all time. Think, for example, of the algorithms that provide us with
suggestions and preferences based on the personal interests that emerge from the
records of our searches on the net. This case is based on the filter bubble paradigm
developed by Eli Pariser [2]. The user finds himself isolated as in a “niche”, where he
receives content in line with his preferences but at the same time he is excluded from
all information that is in contrast with his orientation and opinions. This inevitably
leads to the strengthening of one's convictions (also in the matter of public policies)
and to an impoverishment of the dialectical and confrontational capacities. The
algorithms build a “tailor made world” [3] in which everyone can carve out his or her
own horizon of truth. Will it all be the fault of a civic relativism before digital?
What has been said raises a reflection on the authentic meaning of representative
democracy today. With algorithmic governance, the "government by discussion"
would disappear, that is the theory devised by John Stuart Mill according to which the
political decision is preceded by a public confrontation. Public decision-making
processes, whether bureaucratic or legislative, always require greater technical
awareness. The relationship between law and technique must first be understood [4].
Although law is a social science, it constantly makes use of technical tools. However,
there is no lack of guidelines that support absolute identification. In fact, elective
assemblies are characterized by a continuous interpenetration between technical skills
and political interests. The public relationship between experts and citizens is based
on trust. When this fails, democracy can degenerate into “government by the masses
or into an elite technocracy” [5]. Already in 1884 Gaetano Mosca, a jurist and
political scientist from Palermo, defined the role of the majorities as “passive”: the
organized minorities, called élite, govern [6]. This is the “theory of the ruling class”
[7], which met with great fortune in the elitist doctrine, of which Mosca was a
precursor. Following this approach, the completely evanescent and promethean
character of popular sovereignty will emerge, while the representation of the great
popular masses will reveal itself in an illusion.
Democratic processes are never linear. If it is true that the people of the network do
not coincide with active citizenship, it is equally true that the "virtual square" can
sometimes become a "real square". Think of the many mobilizations that starting from
the network lead to real manifestations. The digital revolution has upset the forms of
citizen participation, both for the construction of consensus and for the determination
of public policies. The most evident example is represented by the fundamental role
of social networks during the Arab Springs, and above all for the popular uprisings
that took place in Tunisia between 2010 and 2011. A return to the past would be
impossible and unhistorical. The processes of digitization must therefore be governed
and not demonized.
3
2 The crisis of “intermediate bodies”
The crisis of representative democracy is in reality the crisis of the represented
subject. The algorithm society transforms the citizen into a mere consumer. The
citizen understood as the holder of rights and duties is thus deprived of both his
individual dimension and his social dimension as he is no longer the bearer of any
category interest. The technological process depersonalizes the voter, making him a
taxable person unable to "participate". Through user preferences, the algorithm directs
the subject towards a specific political orientation. Conversely, the political operator
shapes their political offer by intercepting the trends shown by users on the net. In this
way, the algorithm translates into a consent tool. The value of the user depends on the
value of his information. The relationship between the public sphere and the private
sphere would be based on the collection of data and information of individual users
on the network. The person's identity is stolen. The citizen becomes a complex of
digital information, the only information that is of interest to public power. Can an
algorithm by itself contain the stratifications that hide behind a single electoral
preference? The impact of this system on democratic processes is devastating,
especially when you consider the speed with which content is spread on the web. This
is incalculable and often irreversible damage. For these reasons direct democracy is
the antechamber of plebiscitary democracy.
In Italy, but also in Europe, the transition from the "party" to the "parties"
effectively represented the end of an authoritarian regime and the advent of a
democratic system capable of translating popular will into normative content. In the
work of the Constituent Assembly, therefore, the parties could not fail to find
recognition in the italian Constitution, although this meant having to degrade the
contribution of citizens to that of the parties in determining national politics. The
normative reconstruction of the political party can only start from a combined
provision between arts. 2, 18 and 49 of the Constitution. The recognition of social
formations and freedom of association soon found completion in art. 49, according to
which the parties are the instruments through which citizens contribute with a
democratic method to determine national politics. In parliamentary grammar it is
difficult to understand whether the party competition has replaced the citizens'
competition. Vezio Crisafulli, who already underlines the instrumental function of the
parties with respect to the implementation of the democratic principle and popular
sovereignty, recalls how art. 49 does not foresee particular rights for parties, but rights
for citizens, who freely associate in parties[8]. Popular sovereignty is fully realized in
the bond of representation, no longer only between elected and voters, but between
voters and parties, and between them and the parliamentary groups of which they are
projection in the institutional seats. The perimeter within which the parties act does
not allow, to want to inconvenience the Aquinas, a subversion of the ordinatio
regiminis.
4
About political parties, it seems that everything has been said. It would be
impossible to tell the story of the twentieth century without telling the story of the
parties and the cultural roots on which they are based. It was precisely through the
parties that the "masses" made themselves a state by "breaking" into democratic
institutions. The widening of suffrage and the social legitimacy of popular parties
have certainly transfigured the face of institutions, marking the inevitable crisis of
liberal and classical parliamentarism. There has been talk, perhaps for too long, of a
crisis of the parties, or more properly of a crisis of the intermediate bodies. In this
constitutional contradiction lies the crisis of representativeness, understood as the loss
of collective identity [9]. It should be noted that we are not dealing with a
phenomenon isolated in time and space. In their historical development, in fact, the
parties have experienced phases of health and phases of illness. The political party, by
denying its mediating role, has produced an unprecedented popular bewilderment in
the face of the volatility of social roles. The secularization of ideologies, today
increasingly transversal and the homogenization of category interests, have made
political formations unidentifiable. The dissolution of the social classes, despite the
fact that economic contradictions continue to sharpen, causes the "mastic" that binds
elected and voters together. The 21st century thus appears to be the century of brittle
identities. To “liquid society” [10] can only be correspond “liquid parties”. With the
advent of mass parties, the election becomes a choice, not only of candidates, but of a
real political direction. The post-modern parties have instead renounced being
collectors of ideas. The transliteration of the concept of "idea" with the word
"program" is symptomatic of a new leader drift, decreeing the prevalence of the
individual over the community [11]. The function of political parties lies in the
interpretation of a "particular vision of the general interest", translating the political
program into legally binding acts. The ability, lost by the parties, of recomposing
conflicts, has thus led to a progressive impoverishment of parliamentary
representation and dialectic. This pauperization results in an ever more dense
selection of the interests and lists represented. The political offer is fully considered in
a sprawling collection of proposals, filtered by the political leader according to the
electoral sensitivity. This can be translated into the impossibility, for many social
issues, not only of finding an answer, but above all a place assigned to their
formulation. The party system (Parteienstaat, about Leibholz) died, first under the ax
of Tangentopoli, today with the sovereign and populist contamination that rages in
Europe and the rest of the world. In twentieth-century pluralist democracies, parties
organized social conflict and represented it in the institutional context. It is more
appropriate to speak of "transformation" of democracy rather than "crisis". With the
decline of party politics, the rise of a technocratic society did not follow. Fading away
representative democracy, parties are led to chase instincts, even the most bitter ones,
no longer managing to direct their actions towards the common good. An algocracy to
which Italian politics seems to have resigned itself. With a depreciation of the
5
constitutional role of the political party and its progressive marginalization in
determining legislative choices, the democratic stability of modern constitutional
systems cannot be compromised. A delegitimization that has its roots in the total loss
of adherence and identification with society, until to deny their very usefulness. Get
the clash between citizens and parties, or rather between us and them, makes mutual
recognition impossible. Faced with an absolute absence of structures capable of
connecting the center and the periphery, parties are essential links for the functioning
of democracy, integrated in the trait d’union between people and institutions. In spite
of everything, these remain the hinge between the “palace” and the “square”, but
constitutional law must deal only with the first case.
3 Which democracy is possible?
A deep dividing line distinguishes two antithetical models: “direct democracy” and
“representative democracy”, with the inevitable risk that the former becomes a parody
of the latter. Many of the tools of the so-called “direct democracy” are nothing more
than participatory institutions that integrate with representative democracy, being
complementary to it and compatible with it. Already in unsuspected times there has
been talk of e-Government, that is, the process of digitization of public institutions,
which through the use of ICT favor the “good trend” of public administrations [12].
At the basis of this is the osmotic relationship between the citizen and the state
administrative apparatus. This report is called e-Democracy [13] [14] [15], intended
not only as a suitable tool for online voting, but as a platform for sharing
constitutionally relevant content.
The introduction of electronic voting in democratic systems certainly places limits
on transparency requirements. Think, for example, of how online voting methods can
jeopardize the implementation of the mandatory mandate ban. Electronic voting
would be considered to be devoid of those minimum requirements that can guarantee
personal attribution and secrecy. The Covid-19 pandemic has imposed a new
regulation of parliamentary procedures. According to widespread opinion, the
legislator should intervene to remedy the evident structural deficiencies of the elected
assemblies. Think of "distance learning" in schools or "smart working" in the public
administration. Before Covid, electronic voting in legislative assemblies, called e-
voting, was used exclusively in "presence", through the use of a closed circuit that
allows the individual member of parliament to be able to express their vote
preference. The third paragraph of art. 64 of the Italian Constitution states that the
resolutions of the Parliament are not valid if the majority of their members is not
present. The Constitution would therefore prevent the possibility of voting remotely
as physical presence is an essential requirement for the exercise of political
representation. The political confrontation necessary for the formation of
parliamentary choices would be highly compromised. Although the first means of
6
communication were already in existence in 1947, the Constituent Fathers identified
in the vote in presence a garrison set up to protect the political representation. The use
of alternative spaces certainly favors greater instantaneousness. The Council of
Europe over twenty five years confirmed the compatibility of distance voting in
electronic form with the Code and protocols established by the Venice Commission
[16] [17]. By breaking down the limit of distances, we respond to a need for
communicative transversality, favoring the meeting and dialogue between the social
partners. This push would seem to be in line with the Tallinn Declaration on e-
government, drawn up on the sidelines of the conference on 6 October 2017, in which
relevant European ministers have undertaken to accelerate the spread of electronic
identification means throughout the EU. As can also be seen from the National
Innovation Plan 2025, artificial intelligence and big data will guide public entities
towards increasingly innovative and light administrative procedures, thus
implementing the constitutional principles of good performance and transparency of
public administration.
Are new fundamental rights emerging from technological development without
current regulatory recognition or do already codified rights manifest themselves in a
different form? They are therefore tools that integrate and do not replace traditional
ones. At this point, the thesis supported by Stefano Rodotà to constitutionalize the
right of internet access is understood, understanding it as a functional and essential
paradigm for political participation [18] [19]. In 2015 thanks to the contribution of the
well-known jurist the "Declaration of Internet Rights" was reached. Article 2 of this
document defines access to the Internet as a fundamental right of the person which
contributes to his individual and social development. The article goes on to recall that
"every person has the right to access the Internet on equal terms, with technologically
adequate and up-to-date methods that remove all economic and social obstacles". The
European Union intervened with the EU Regulation of 25 November 2015 which
defines common rules to ensure equal treatment of Internet access services, while
protecting the rights of citizens-users. Free internet access is today the most advanced
tool to concretely implement the principle of equality, thus reducing the "digital
divide". The epidemic has certainly exacerbated economic and social disparities in
Europe and the rest of the world. Not all families can take advantage of a stable
connection to the Internet or a sufficient number of suitable devices to meet the
multiple professional or educational needs. The right to access the Internet is to be
considered a social right, or rather a subjective claim to public services that national
institutions must guarantee to their citizens through public policies. It would therefore
be a question of a right which, although not yet codified, can nevertheless be traced
back to current constitutional provisions. In the age of globalization, the legal
problems of a constitutional nature deriving from technological development can no
longer find a suitable place for their solution in the national dimension alone.
7
4 Final considerations
That democracy accuses a state of fatigue is an incontrovertible fact. It is therefore
necessary to identify the deepest causes of this malaise. The democratic system as we
know it today is far from the model of the ancients. Any equipment would be
anachronistic and misleading. If Athenian democracy is based on participation
understood as a shared exercise of power, contemporary democracies presuppose a
circuit of representation for their very existence. It is not a system of self-government
but a system of control and limitation of the government itself [20], as the most
classic constitutional theories suggest. It is perhaps more appropriate to speak
therefore of the transformation of democracy rather than of "crisis", not a static
principle but in constant evolution. Democracy reflects the culture and sensitivity of
the time, borrowing and changing them. Moreover, it has happened several times
throughout history: from the Jacobin-inspired democracies to the liberal ones based
on the census of the late nineteenth century, up to the mass ones of the twentieth
century [21]. What if permeability to transformations really guaranteed the continuity
of democratic systems? Only totalitarian regimes, in fact, resist any change by trying
at all costs to remain equal to themselves [22]. It is clear up to now that the notion of
democracy cannot certainly exhaust its meaning included in the form of government.
European civilization has gone from being the cradle of advanced democracy to
becoming the sepulcher of a democracy attacked first and then regressed. There are
no freedoms other than a democratic framework. But there is not necessarily a
complete democracy where substantial equality is not guaranteed. Economic
development often, but not always, conditions the democratic index of an state [23].
Democratic processes are long procedures that require deep sedimentation. This
distinguishes a mature democracy from a fragile democracy. This reflection leads us
to the age-old question of the democratization of the Middle Eastern, African or Asian
countries. Embryonic attempts that in most cases perish themselves dramatically after
sharp accelerations.
In conclusion, the use of new technologies must be implemented in administrative
processes. The contribution of increasingly advanced digital tools constitutes the
implementation of the constitutional principles of good performance and impartiality
of the P.A. As regards specifically the constitutional law profiles, however, the use of
new forms of participation encounters two fundamental limits: instrumentality and
accessibility. The use of digital platforms can encourage participation but must place
the human person at the center, which is the beginning and end of the democratic
order. In this sense, technology is instrumental to citizens and their role within the
institutions and parliamentary assemblies. The concept of accessibility, on the other
hand, relates to the ability of the internet to bring citizens closer to public policies.
Constitutionally relevant contents are made accessible to the community without any
distinction. Digital accessibility therefore becomes an emanation of the principle of
8
equality, thus imposing economic investments aimed at bridging the digital divide and
promoting computer literacy on several levels. This extension of content does not
always correspond to greater democratic participation. The audience that widens on
the net, narrows to the urns. The demonstration that the use of digital platforms has
not increased the spaces for democracy lies in the ever more widespread and growing
level of abstention throughout Europe.
The speed of legislative processes is the element that most divides the forms of
direct democracy from the representative one. We must start from an irrefutable fact:
it is impossible to deny the strategic importance of artificial intelligence in democratic
processes. Representative and direct democracy need not necessarily oppose each
other. A mixed system could be theorized. It is possible to insert elements of direct
democracy in a classical representation system [24]. A winning model to relaunch the
relationship between representation and technology is that of the Electronic Town
Meeting (e-TM). It is a way of directly involving citizens on specific territorial issues.
This is done through public debates and comparisons. The Town Meeting was born in
North America, specifically within the ecclesiastical assemblies of New England.
This institute of participation has been transliterated in Europe with the name of
Electronic Town Meeting, through IT methods that allow spaces for discussion
between citizens on issues of local interest. It could also be a successful model in Italy
at the peripheral level, as this experience is in line with the ancient Italian municipal
tradition.
In a climate of growing disaffection for the public issues, the low turnout is
directly proportional to the increasingly limited commitment of citizens to political
formations and associations. The reduction in the number of parliamentarians, the
continuous attempts to limit the exercise of the free mandate and the progressive
introduction of digital voting tools are the immediate consequences of the loss of
centrality of parliaments, increasingly marginal in the balance of powers. But is
democracy still a goal in our country? Is this really an unfulfilled promise? Think of
the conquest of universal suffrage in the age of revolutions. Suffice it to think more
recently about environmental law, the ever more pronounced protection of minorities
or the consolidation of human rights by extending their recognition in international
law [25]. The new challenge remains that of preventing pluralist democracies from
degenerating into populist democracies, antechambers of political experiences already
dramatically lived. Moreover, from anti-political criticism to anti-democratic criticism
the step is short. To be healthy, democracy must live a continuous tension between
demos and kratos, only in this way will it remain «the least good of the good forms
and the least bad of the bad forms» [26].
9
References
[1] MALVICINI M., Parlamento e fake-news: spunti per un dibattito, in federalismi.it, n.11/2020,
p. 339 (2020).
[2] PARISER E., The Filter Bubble: What the Internet Is Hiding from You (2011).
[3] ZANON N., Fake news e diffusione dei social media: abbiamo bisogno di un’“Autorità
Pubblica della Verità”?, in Media Laws, n.2/2018, p.13 (2018).
[4] CHELI E., Scienza, tecnica e diritto: dal modello costituzionale agli indirizzi. Della
giurisprudenza costituzionale, in Rivista AIC, n. 1/2017, pp. 1-2 (2017).
[5] NICHOLS T., The Death of Expertise. The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and
Why It Matters, Oxford (2017).
[6] MOSCA G., Teorica dei governi e governo parlamentare,in ID. Scritti politici, UTET, 1st
edn. 1884, Torino (1982).
[7] MOSCA G., Elementi di scienza politica, Laterza (1896).
[8] CRISAFULLI V., Partiti, Parlamento, Governo in P.L. ZAMPETTI (a cura di), La funzionalità
dei partiti nello Stato democratico. Atti del I° Congresso nazionale di dottrina dello Stato,
Editore La Nuova Europa, p. 93, Milano (1967).
[09] ROMANO S., Lo Stato moderno e la sua crisi , Pisa (1909).
[10] BAUMAN Z., Modernità liquida (2002).
[11] E. GUGLIELMINETTI, Che cos’è un partito politico?, in costituzionalismo.it, , fasc. 3/2015,
p.179 (2015).
[12] R. NANNUCCI, M. A. BIASIOTTI, Verso nuove forme di democrazia partecipativa:
esperienze, metodologie e prospettive dell’e-Democracy, in Informatica e diritto, XXX y., Vol.
XIII, n. 1-2, pp. 67-119 (2004).
[13] LINDNER, G. AICHHOLZER R., HENNEN L., Electronic Democracy in Europe. Prospects and
Challenges of E-Publics, E-Participation and E-Voting, Springer (2016).
[14] ALVAREZ R. M., HALL T. E., Point, Click, and Vote: The Future of Internet Voting,
Brookings Institution Press, Washington, D.C. (2003).
[15] ALVAREZ R. M., HALL T. E., Electronic Elections: The Perils And Promises Of Digital
Democracy, Princeton University Press, Princeton (2008).
[16] CLEMENTI F., Proteggere la democrazia rappresentativa tramite il voto elettronico:
problemi, esperienze e prospettive (anche nel tempo del coronavirus). Una prima introduzione,
in federalismi.it, n. 6/2020, p. 217 (2020).
[17] Venice Commission, Rapporto sulla compatibilità del voto a distanza e il voto elettronico
con gli standard del Consiglio d'Europa, 58a Sessione plenaria, 12-13 marzo 2004, p. 11 e ss.
[18] RODOTÀ S., La sovranità nel tempo della tecnopolitica. Democrazia elettronica e
democrazia rappresentativa, in Politica del diritto, fasc. 4/1993, pp. 569-600 (1993).
[19] MARCELLI F. , MARSOCCI P., PIETRANGELO M. (a cura di), La rete Internet come spazio di
partecipazione politica: una prospettiva giuridica, Editoriale Scientifica, p. 70, Napoli (2015).
[20] SARTORI G., Elementi di teoria politica, il Mulino, p.41, Bologna (1995).
[21] HELD D., Modelli di democrazia, il Mulino, Bologna (1989).
[22] G. COSTA , La democrazia cambia pelle, in Aggiornamenti Sociali, 10/2019, pp. 621-628.
[23] DAHL R., La democrazia economica, il Mulino, Bologna (1989).
[24] RODOTÀ S., Iperdemocrazia. Come cambia la sovranità democratica con il web, Laterza,
p.22 (2013).
[25] BONGIOVANNI G., GOZZI G., Democrazia, in BARBERA A. (a cura di) Le basi filosofiche del
costituzionalismo, Edizioni Laterza, p. 247 (2019).
[26] BOBBIO N., Democrazia, in Dizionario di politica, UTET, p. 309, Torino (1983).