Governing the Digital Society

Platforms, Artificial Intelligence, and Public Values
Erscheinungsjahr 2025
ISBN: 978-90-485-6271-8
Verlag: Amsterdam University Press

Buch, Englisch, Band 5, 264 Seiten, Format (B × H): 156 mm x 234 mm

Reihe: Digital Studies

Digital technologies have rapidly become integral to communities and societies, bringing both significant benefits and serious concerns. Issues such as misinformation, disinformation, online polarization, discrimination, and widening inequalities have prompted a critical and urgent debate: Can digital societies still be effectively governed? This book brings together insights from various disciplines to address the pressing question: “How can we develop and apply principles of (good) governance in digital societies that are organized democracies?”

Governing the Digital Societypresents a range of governance approaches, focusing on online platforms, artificial intelligence, and the public values that underpin these technologies. The authors position themselves at the forefront of their disciplines, offering perspectives from law, critical data studies, urban studies, science and technology studies, computational linguistics, and the political economy of media. Expert interviews provide additional insights into ongoing efforts to tackle the challenges of governing digital societies. The book demonstrates that governance is not just a technical or legal process but a complex societal one, embedding norms, values, and morality into our institutions and daily lives.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Helmond, Anne

van Dijck, José

Vlist, Fernando van der

van Es, Karin

Dijck, Jose van

Fachgebiete

• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaften: Forschung und Information Datenanalyse, Datenverarbeitung
• Sozialwissenschaften Medien- und Kommunikationswissenschaften Medienwissenschaften

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Figures

List of Tables

About the Authors

Acknowledgements

Introduction: Governing the Digital Society

Section 1: Governing Platforms

Decentralized Online Social Networks: Technological and Organizational Choices and Their Public Value Trade-offs, Mathilde Sanders and José van Dijck

Platform cooperatives as an additional strategy for empowering platform workers, Gabriël van Rosmalen

Governing the ‘Third Half of the Internet’: The Dynamics of Human and AI-assisted Content Moderation, Cedric Waterschoot

Constitutional Aspects of Trusted Flaggers in The Netherlands, Jacob van de Kerkhof

Interview with Catalina Goanta, by Taylor Annabell

Section 2: Governing Artificial Intelligence

Governing the Global Proliferation of Digital Surveillance Technologies: Lessons from the EU, Machiko Kanetake

The Governance of Generative AI: Three Conditions for Research and Policy, Fabian Ferrari

The Long-term Usefulness of Regulating AI in the EU, Lisanne Hummel

Interview with Natali Helberger, by Fabian Ferrari

Section 3: Governing Public Values

The Techno-Politics of Conversational AI’s Moral Agency: Examining ChatGPT and ErnieBot as Examples, Jing Zeng and Karin van Es

Doing Inclusion: Negotiation and Co-creation for People-centric Smart Cities, Michiel de Lange, Erna Ruijer and Krisztina Varró

Motherhood in the Datafied Welfare State: Investigating the Gendered and Racialized Enactment of Citizenship in Dutch Algorithmic Governance, Gerwin van Schie, Laura Candidatu and Diletta Huyskes

Fostering Autonomy in the Digital Classroom: Strengthening Schools’ Control over Data and Pedagogy through Collective Action, Niels Kerssens and Karin van Es

Interview with Janneke Gerards, by Viktorija Morozovaite

Concluding comments: An assessment of governing the digital society, Albert Meijer

Index

Über Autor(innen)

van Dijck, José
José van Dijck is Distinguished University Professor of Media and Digital Society at Utrecht University since 2017. In 2021, she received the Spinoza Prize, which has made this edited volume possible.

Vlist, Fernando van der
Fernando van der Vlist is Assistant Professor and program coordinator for the Master’s Cultural Data at the University of Amsterdam.

Helmond, Anne
Anne Helmond is Associate Professor of Media, Data and Society at Utrecht University. She is co-director of the focus area Governing the Digital Society.

van Es, Karin
Karin van Es is Associate Professor of Media and Culture Studies and project lead Humanities at Data School, both at Utrecht University.