The COVID-19 pandemic has further highlighted the market power of large technology companies and the inadequacy of current digital governance and regulation. What should policymakers do to address Big Tech’s growing clout and build an equitable digital economy?
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Powerful governments and special interests know that people tend to associate risks and dangers such as illness, natural disaster, and famine with conduct that transgresses societal norms. When people believe that “better behavior” can remedy a threat, they work hard to force that behaviour on everyone.
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Most Americans think with its democracy, the United States has the best form of government. China, with its one-party dictatorial state, communist or otherwise, has the worst form. This is China’s Achilles’ heel and will spell the downfall of the Chinese Communist Party. In reality, from the Chinese people’s perspective and theirs alone, their government today enjoys greater legitimacy and popularity than any American or Western government with respect to their own citizens.
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One needs an expert driver, but the driver does not get to decide where to go. As data, knowledge, technology and expertise are available for hire and purchase, the real mark of a leader will increasingly be his or her intuitive power and instinctive capability to understand the public mood and influence it. Emotions unfettered by expertise is dangerous; and expertise dismissive of emotions in ineffective. That is the leadership dilemma of our times.
Threatening the world with a long recession, the coronavirus looks set to inaugurate a turbulent new political and economic era. Its main tendencies will become visible over the months and years to come. But the most revolutionary shift is already in sight. The state, much maligned in recent decades, is back, and in its fundamental role: as Leviathan, the preventer of anarchy, and the ultimate insurance against an intolerable human condition in which life is “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.”
India today is not only on a path toward becoming an authoritarian, Hindu majoritarian state, but its economic engine is also sputtering, and its military will remain ill-equipped to balance China. Rather than serving as an ally or vital strategic partner, India may end up becoming a liability for the United States. As India chooses the path of diversification, or “multi-alignment,” in Asia, so too must the United States—especially in South Asia.
It is clear that U.S.-based technology companies will continue to shape the geo-economic trajectory of data governance, and thus play a key role in the trade, investment and diplomatic landscape in Asia. So long as the Big Tech lobby works closely in consultation with the governments of emerging economies to respect sovereign autonomy and promote citizen welfare over rabid corporate greed, it will continue to be a key stakeholder in shaping a free, fair and equitable digital future.
Today, nearly ten years later, the situation in the Middle East looks even worse than it did before the Arab Spring. Political repression is more onerous. Economic growth is sluggish and unequal. Corruption remains rampant. Gender equality is more aspiration than reality. Yet something fundamental has changed. Arab governments have traditionally rested on what political scientists call an “authoritarian bargain,” in which the state provides jobs, security, and services in exchange for political loyalty. This bargain is based on the assumption that ordinary people will remain passive. But today, that assumption no longer holds. Citizens no longer fear their governments.
Elites have always used their privileged position and access to resources for self-serving purposes, not for the greater good of humanity. And this abuse continues, disguised, as elites harness artificial intelligence and other new technologies to reach new levels of power previously undreamed of. A new breed of elites is born: “ailites”.
