Power With Instead of Power Over: How Algorithms Are Affecting Current Digitized Politics
[This text was submitted to Cambridge University’s Three Dot Project]
This paper proposes that digital technologies are moving autonomous citizens, elections, and whole societies toward a power-sharing model.
Three case studies will be examined: the Maidan Revolutions in Ukraine, the Obama political campaigns, and the global woman's march of January 2017. The paper will conclude with suggestions for how contemporary politics should adapt around three specific issues:
involving citizens in the political process;
dealing with global economic inequities; and
expanding today’s women's roles in political action campaigns.
A book outline could include an introduction, a chapter on digital networks as political action and one on power concepts. Then a chapter could deal with each of the three case studies. Finally, there would be practical suggestions at the end around the three issues: getting citizens involved more, dealing with inequality, and with women's roles.
Introduction
I remember when I was first introduced to a communication satellite up close. A colleague from the satellite firm proposed that he conduct me on a tour of the factory. There she stood: a wonder of modern technology and one that would provide a global communication bridge forcing wide and deep societal change.
I didn’t know then that my own Harvard dissertation would explore the policy framework for the first direct-to-home satellite -- to be developed by Comsat. Nor that I would spend a sabbatical semester in Europe, allowing me to confer with all European Union ministers as they processed the privatization of their state telecom operations. And the additional global travel as an invited member of an International Commission studying how communication was moving from an instrument of power into a global culture itself. As I was guided by studies at MIT with Ithiel de Sola Pool, author of Technologies of Freedom, I became aware that political action around the globe was about to change as individuals, local communities and global groups were linked for political action.
We need to reflect further on the stunning changes under way in communication patterns. These changes are empowering people, revolutionizing global economies and challenging the credibility of authority structures in corporate, public service and ecclesial organizations.
When large numbers of people are nodes in a communication network, using Facebook, Twitter and the telephones they have in their pockets, the messages cannot be controlled. This communication pattern empowers groups; authority, whether legitimate or not, seems to move from the top to the grass roots.
This paper will explore some of the implications of digital technologies for politics globally.
Digital Networks and Political Action
We have already seen evidence of what could be called hashtag (#) political action – in the Arab spring, in Ukraine’s Maidan revolutions and in the largest historical global gathering or street demonstration to date, the Women’s March organized around the world on January 7, 2017, one day after the Inauguration of President Donald Trump in the US. The Women’s March demonstrates a reaction to the Trump election, but behind the scenes a technological operation was active through the Trump campaign. This paper will refer to the Maidan actions in Ukraine and the Women’s March, along with the highly digitized election processes of Barack Obama’s election. The technology at the heart of that campaign empowered the election of the first black President in US history. And the technology tools have advanced since the Obama team managed them to empower both his election campaigns.
What are some of the implications of these digitized tools in general? As Clay Sharkey notes in Here Comes Everybody, new technologies enable new kinds of group-forming, to what has been called “an architecture of participation”. Sharkey notes: “The groups now adopting social tools form the experimental wing of political philosophy, a place where hard questions of group governance are being worked out”.
A major analysis of the Network Age is the trilogy authored by Manuel Castells: The Rise of the Network Society; The Power of Identity; and The End of Millennium. The author spends much time studying networked social movements as an important feature of the global information world: terrorism; crime; anti- globalization; the increasing role of women; the fall of what he calls patriarchalism; environmentalism and liberation movements, along with the chaos of global financial systems.
Interestingly, what I call “individuation” is occurring alongside, or inside of, new group patterns. This is called “the project of the self” by Anthony Giddens, whereas institutions have legitimized identity in the past, generating civil society, identity-for-resistance is the result of people globally resenting the loss of control over their individual life, nation and environment. This continues to foment group revolts and makes politics, as practiced up to now, uneven or rebellious.
A positive way of reflecting on all this and reacting is to be aware of the depth of the change and for politics to be recycled in ways that cope better. Donald Trump responded by stoking fear in the electorate. Later in this paper I will suggest some more positive alternatives. Meanwhile, some reflection on how power works and how networks are changing power structures can be helpful.
Power With Instead of Power Over
Quite understandably the subjects of power and power dynamics have been of great interest both theoretically and in the practical realm. Theorists of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries form an interesting context for contemporary politics.
Kenneth Boulding spoke of The Three Faces of Power in the 1990s book of that title. He mentioned that it is in social systems that power is most important and that integrative power is the most significant, leading to later theories of cooperation as a valuable strategic planning tool. In this connection he warned that “hierarchical power cannot survive unless it can be legitimized.” (unless there is “latent veto power” down below).
Kenneth Clark spoke of “the pathos of power” and how social power is a struggle for integration for organismic and social systems. Reflecting on antipoverty programs, Clark noted that if the poor are treated as objects to be manipulated, these programs were doomed to fail because they reflect a lack of commitment to share power with the powerless.
Joseph Nye has analyzed power in our contemporary world and has coined language currently in use when discussing power: hard power (coercion) and soft power (persuasion); and smart power, requiring well-designed strategies and skillful leadership. He also addresses behavioral power in contrast to power based on resources alone. He concludes that the secret of success of United States power is that it is often networked power.
One of my favorite power theorists is Mary Parker Follett, a woman who in the early 1900s helped establish the Harvard Business School. She used the concept of “power with instead of power over” in her lectures and writings. Follett notes that most people spend much of their time trying to get power, for example in conversations. In contrast Follett felt “genuine power is capacity”. When such a view is later enriched by “the project of the self” (Giddens, above), we can see how these theories strengthen modern liberation movements and street demonstrations. Follett notes that power does not necessarily mean just strength as when an invalid exerts power over others, or as Gandhi used a method of noncooperation as a use of power. He once said: “I wish to conquer you by my sufferings”.
And to examine some of these concepts “on the ground” we can turn to three interesting and somewhat different case studies: the Maidan revolutions in Ukraine, the presidential elections of Barack Obama in the US and the Global Woman’s March on January 21, 2017.
Case Study #1: Ukraine
The nation of Ukraine presents an interesting case of political action and the varied role of technology historically in these actions.
When modern Ukraine voted for its independence in 1991, over 90% of the people voted for nationhood after decades of suppression under both the Nazis and the Soviet Union. This was certainly a strong political statement by a people accustomed, in its recent history, to domination.
Only thirteen years later, in its Orange Revolution of November-December 2004, over a million people came out into the streets in Kyiv and its public square known as Maidan, to protest a “rigged” election that claimed that Victor Yanukovych won. Another candidate, Victor Yushchenko, had been poisoned with dioxin that showed clearly in his damaged face.
The mass media and emails (contemporary technology) kept Ukrainians of all ages informed when the streets around the country began to fill in protest. Winter did not deter people of all ages, decked in orange scarves, who stayed on the streets to peacefully demand that their Parliament and Supreme Court renegotiate the election process.
There was no violence on the Maidan, but tea was served by citizens and ecumenical services were held allowing a prayerful people to ask for God’s protection as they appealed for justice. Eventually another election was held and Yushchenko was inaugurated President of this newly independent nation with an ancient history.
In a subsequent election Yanukovych was chosen President and he began to lead Ukraine toward a closer association with Europe. This displeased Russia’s Putin and suddenly, Yanukovych was convinced by Putin “to turn from years of negotiating strategic political and trade agreements with the European Union (and) ditching them, instead turning to Moscow for a lifeline in the form of money and energy and trade privileges” (theguardian.com, January 23, 2014). A Facebook post by the journalist Mustafa Nayem called young people to come to the Maidan to protest against the decision of Yanukovych not to sign the Association Agreement with the European Union.
Another Maidan erupted (called by some EuroMaidan), this time fueled by Facebook, Twitter and cell phone technology. Instant communication among the young people in Independence Square allowed quicker movements and video recordings as police and snipers introduced violence resulting in many deaths and injuries. In addition to the technologies, of course, the violent action of the regime to the nation, especially its youth, was extremely important in sustaining the demonstrations. Yanukovych eventually fled to Russia and jubilant Ukrainians once again had their country back. Russia has since unlawfully annexed Crimea and invaded Eastern Ukraine and used hackers to temporarily interfere with Ukraine’s infrastructure.
The battle of technologies continues to inform political action in Ukraine.
Case Study #2: The Elections of Barack Obama
Algorithms were a serious part of Barack Obama’s campaign. As many youth and experienced consultors gathered around the idealism of Obama, variables were given different weights in complex equations to test different models. Some experiments helped bring voter-contact costs down. Various algorithms were used to study voter behavior. Increased computer power allowed various statistical regressions.
As the teams moved to individual-level modeling, many local political actors were annoyed. The importance of social psychology emerged: why people do what they do; why people do not vote; the value of customized messages; the power of shame in voters; learning what, exactly, voters really care about.
I sat at a computer almost daily during both Obama election campaigns. Working from Democratic Party software that listed potential party voters we did the computer input as telephone calls and door-to-door canvassing results came back each day, evening, and weekend. If someone indicated they would vote for Obama’s election competitor this would be entered into the computer and no time would be spent contacting that voter for the rest of the campaign. Campaign volunteers continually asked supporters if they could volunteer; the workers grew in numbers as the campaign progressed.
And all the while, from various data bases, the profile of each individual county grew so campaign headquarters nationally knew as the election advanced just what counties needed a last-minute push to get the numbers needed for victory.
Much election literature and personal contact fueled the election dynamics, but at the heart of the election design was data, data, data – constantly fed into computers and analyzed by digital experts.
Of course, the data banks were invaluable for fundraising also. Much of Obama’s funding came in small donations so many donors had to be monitored by computers and emailed regularly to keep the enthusiasm and funding flow alive.
One computer program was designed to allow any volunteer to make calls at home by using the data base of the campaign. Thus people from Boston were regularly calling California voters because the software system made this possible.
At the heart of the Obama campaign was a large amount of statistical analysis so they could analyze what worked and what didn’t. They discovered election campaigns spend millions of dollars without doing research on what actually works! As the potential of cloud computing and big data grow, elections will continue to become more and more sophisticated, allowing targeting of voters to discover their preferences and how to move them to the polls.
Case Study #3: The Woman’s March of January 21, 2017
Much of the world was stunned by the election victory of Donald J. Trump in November 2016. Some of the reasons for the victory are still being unraveled, but the anger among millions of women continued to rise during the period after the election.
The largest global demonstration of women to date began with a Facebook entry. Word spread like wildfire and organizational plans moved into action. Just organizing 1600 buses to bring people from all over the country to the Washington DC march seemed like a miracle to many. Tweets, texts and phone calls happened because by this date smart phones were ubiquitous. Even as the buses moved toward various cities selfie photos were cementing friendships. Just as many women are sensitive to daily practical matters, even instructions about the size of the bags for food were shared. Women globally were on the move!
In the months ahead there will be much study of this march – the issues that maddened women, the varied messages they wanted to deliver, the bonding cemented by some of the Trump comments during his election campaign. There was a sense among women that their rights would be trampled upon if they didn’t fight back. For some there was guilt that they had not voted, assuming that Trump would lose the election.
And now women in many corners of the globe know that modern communication technologies connect them to each other. And they can make their voices heard!
Digital Technologies are Driving Power-Sharing Politics
I have developed a model (see Appendix) showing how technology mechanisms affect both organizational structures and communication patterns – as if all three were cylinders on a shaft spun by change. There are barriers, of course: structures and communication patterns that don’t want to change or don’t want to collaborate. However, the movement, in my model, is toward the institutionalization of collaborative mechanisms – making collaboration a social habit (which is what an institution is.) Finally, interactive strategic alliances are formed (shared access, a wider sense of shared responsibility, and more participative communication forums.
Participative Political Power
Citizen involvement is at the heart of all political action and there are many ways technology can enhance this participation. Technology can enable voter registration and voting itself; it can allow rapid analysis of voting patterns and election results.
Interactive technologies can empower citizen responses on any number of current policy questions. Polling techniques, relatively unreliable now, can be vastly improved with the easy accumulation of almost unlimited data points. As cloud computing and big data advance these technologies can allow larger pools of citizen responses so political leaders are not guessing on matters of great interest to voters. When these data are not available, political leaders have a difficult time sensing what the public’s priorities are.
As post-Trump election events are showing, many people now realize just how important their participation in party politics is. And street demonstrations and email messages promise to rebuild the Democratic Party as a more grassroots organization and one that recognizes the importance of jobs to many individuals in small towns and throughout rural America. As the Obama elections and the Maidan revolutions proved, youth can become engaged in politics if their voices are heard and their technological talents are valued. And the Woman’s March showed a startled globe that women seem ready to roar.
New technologies have eroded jobs and many more people will be laid off by robotics and autonomous road vehicles, to name just a few technological advances. Policymakers will need to address inequality and hierarchies are already crumbling so many more election surprises will lay ahead. Liberation movements of past decades – for women and for minorities, for example – seem to indicate that the 99% will not continue to allow the 1% to garner most of the wealth. Thus, political parties will have to commit, honestly, to strategic alliances that foster change – to commit to power with instead of mere power over.
Appendix
