From big data to big democracy

Data accompanies us throughout our lives today, both in our private and business lives. Yet the age of digitalization has only just begun. The amount of information that everyone produces about themselves and their actions increases with every website login, every new app downloaded and even with every click. Data is the currency of the 21st century. It’s high time we thought about who is allowed to dispose of these treasures.

Google, Amazon, Facebook, Apple and all the other tech companies say that they want to use the information that we give them, sometimes more, sometimes less voluntarily, to create a better society. However, we data donors are at the mercy of the Silicon Valley giants, and ultimately profit still takes precedence over altruism for the corporations. But this state of affairs is not acceptable. We data citizens should take care to retain sovereignty over our data and only pass it on if it is used to create added value for society in a transparent manner. When I think of this kind of digital common good, I have education, health and mobility in mind, for example. In my view, it is even an ethical imperative if the data treasures from such socially highly relevant areas are available solely for the benefit of all and not just a few, purely profit-oriented companies.

In Barcelona, for example, we can see what happens when data serves the common good. For several years now, citizens of the Catalonian metropolis have been able to submit proposals for the city government’s agenda via a digital platform and vote on such proposals. The result is, for example, new traffic-calmed zones in which life and business are flourishing. And citizens who are taking a renewed interest in local politics because they feel that this participatory democracy brings quality of life to society. In Barcelona, users of the apps also receive information from the municipal data pool, such as how much_CO2 and waste is produced in their district, how long the waiting times are at the doctor’s or whether the metro is running late. All data is managed transparently and locally. In the areas of education, health and mobility, there are certainly numerous opportunities to further develop such models in the interests of the common good. For me, this opportunity to make politics more transparent – even if it is only at a local level – and bring it closer to the citizen is very appealing. I see it as a way of counteracting what the Belgian historian and writer David van Reybrouck calls the “democratic exhaustion syndrome”. If big data becomes a big democracy, this will certainly also increase the general interest in social participation. Digitalization is certainly neither a bogeyman nor a saviour. But if we reject it, we are letting the opportunity to strengthen social cohesion pass us by.