As the use of technology has increased exponentially in the past few years, so has its involvement in the political sphere. But the relationship between technology and politics is far from simple. It can be used for good, to strengthen democracy by increasing political engagement, but it can also be used as a weapon against a fair democracy, like when bots are used to share fake news and information.

 

First, technology makes a great democratization of publishing and public discourse possible, but this does not determine whether or not that potential will be realized. As more and more countries around the world share data and statistics with their citizens, it has become easier to connect people to local issues and national issues by helping us all make more informed political decisions for our communities and allowing us to have a voice.

 

On the other hand, technologically-advanced democracies like the United States are digital glass houses with specific vulnerabilities, like weak mechanisms for distinguishing facts from fiction and the inability of the government to oversee issues related to the information environment. This means that the information that citizens use to inform how they vote, protest, and debate in the public sphere is distributed through an unmediated social media environment that provides news 24/7. In addition to this, elections, the heart and soul of democracies, are vulnerable to cyberattacks, which is especially harmful since the Internet and social media are becoming the center of gravity for future political campaigns. Social media platforms have taken positive steps to protect from meddling bots through developing algorithms, but advances in artificial intelligence technologies in coming years may allow them to outpace our abilities to defend against them.

 

As technology becomes more advanced, it is important that we figure out effective ways to place limitations on it to make sure that our democracy is not attacked by trolls and artificial intelligence, but not so many limitations that the internet can no longer be a tool for information sharing and public discourse.