Digital public sphere: between technological determinism and democratic regression
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5007/1677-2954.2024.e105348Keywords:
Public sphere, Technological determinism, Deliberative democracy, Democratic regressionAbstract
Technological determinism can be defined as the perspective that advocates the unilateral direction of social reproduction by a logic of autonomous functioning of technological transformations, which is considered to escape the direct conditioning and influences of the socio-cultural and political environment. It can be regarded as an anti-democratic ideology, insofar as it legitimizes the impoverishment or eradication of collective decision-making processes directed towards the dynamics of technological diversification. This article aims to provide a critical evaluation of Jürgen Habermas' recent contribution on the so-called digital public sphere, focusing on the challenges posed by technological determinism. While acknowledging the centrality of the history of new digital technologies in Habermas' work, we identify three primary argumentative strategies he employs to challenge technological determinism in the assessment of the new structural changes in the public sphere. We argue that these lines of argument are important components for a critique of new digital media in terms of its ability to meet democratic legitimacy expectations, based on criteria of equal inclusion and discursive quality. However, we also highlight significant limitations in the author's approach to these lines of argument, relating to the links established between the structural transformations of the public sphere and recent patterns of capitalist reproduction, the complexity of novel forms of subjectivation and the constraints on the formation of the political agenda.
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