Digital societies must be allowed to be digital democracies 

What are societies if not people and their stories? Societies are driven by stories – it is how people have shaped aspirations that underpin all forms of progress. Storytelling in its professional form has been the domain of media and its journalists – together constituting an acknowledged function as the Fourth Estate (the other being parliament/governing structures, the executive and the judiciary) of all modern states. 

But two relatively recent developments are roughing up the functionality of this traditional four-pillar structure and throwing up new realities for which key actors – from political parties to governments and from bureaucracies to the media industry itself – are unprepared. This is upending the nature of journalism and the shape of conventional democracy. 

First is the overall co-option of professional media by states – even democracies – to impose the narrow worldview of states at odds with the public interest and a connected world. This phenomenon is a spillover from the late 20th century but has gained dominant status. Look at the broad support in the Western media for the American ‘war on terrorism’ that ended up killing and destroying the lives of millions in countries which had nothing to do with 9/11 and messing up the global economy, affecting billions. Or consider the current tacit endorsement in Western media for asymmetrical Israeli aggression with genocidal overtones in lands housing Palestinians.

Dismissing people’s right to express themselves as ‘hate speech’ or treating online dissent as ‘digital terrorism’ is a Big Brother 20th century approach with no place in this century.

Adnan Rehmat

Result: The trust in conventional media to be representative of the public interest is running low everywhere. Virtually the only narrative resistance to entrenched security-focused priorities of state are independent citizens’ narratives on social media – people have become their own media!

Second is the dizzying pace of the digitalization of societies. At the start of the 21st century, the Internet was not commonplace, there was no social media and AI was not even in the public consciousness. Now the world cannot operate without the Internet, and billions lead online lives on social media – for personal, commercial and public utility – and AI is ready to equalize the power of information control between citizens and states. This will alter the very nature of social discourse.

Combined, these two developments have forced a splintering of the Fourth Estate (media industry, mostly now subsumed by state and corporate interests) and birthed a new column supporting the state structure: “citizens-connected-by-Internet” that have become their own form of communication and civic action. Academic circles have just started to call this the ‘Fifth Estate’ as it has both a critical mass that transcends state ideologies or geographic boundaries and also commands the power of near-instant social outcomes.

No wonder most states – always many paces behind the aspirations of the societies they govern – are reacting the only way they are structured to do with their rigid forms of power: crackdown on this ‘fifth estate’ seen as a new distinct free-spirited actor amassing large-scale power as the primary news agenda setter. With the ‘fifth estate’ brushing aside a deeply compromised Fourth Estate, many say the post-journalism era is already here.

Empowered by technologies no longer only the domain of states, disillusioned and restive ‘citizens-connected-by-Internet’ are taking matters in their own hands and creating a new citizen-led echo-chamber of non-mediated popular narratives that is rattling governments.

So alarmed by this new form of often leaderless but tidal ‘digital democracy’ are regional establishments that even in legal democracies in Asia – such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Nepal – they are in overdrive in Internet shutdowns and slowdowns, banning of social media platforms and legislating a slew of outmoded laws and regulations aimed at restricting dissent and free speech online.

But here’s the thing – suppression is not working. Crude crackdowns on Internet access and speeds – from Bangladesh to India, Indonesia to Pakistan and Cambodia to Sri Lanka – as a means of suppressing dissent and disillusionment is creating political upheavals and generating its own resistance. In some instances – Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Pakistan – this has not stopped the ‘fifth estate’ executing startling ousters of governments as well as cutting down regime size or influence in India and Indonesia – all in the span of 15 months.

Where do we go from here? Curbing citizen aspirations of digitalized societies or means of expressing them is not the future. States must embrace change and modernize further. Digital rights, including Internet access, like rights to life and open societies, must be accepted as a new universal and fundamental human right.

Without this, optimal political inclusivity in politics everywhere will be unnaturally curtailed and fuel social instability. The Internet – including social media – is not just a medium of expression but also one of commerce, empowerment and a great equalizer in social progress. While regulations against online crime are necessary, dismissively declaring people’s right to express themselves as ‘hate speech’ or treating online dissent as ‘digital terrorism’ is a Big Brother 20th century approach that has no place in the 21st Century.

– Adnan Rehmat is a Pakistan-based journalist, researcher and analyst with interests in politics, media, development and science.

X: @adnanrehmat1