The Democratizing Power of the Internet… And What Does that Mean Exactly?

In a recent article, Evgeny Morozov challenges “a new form of technological determinism according to which the Internet would be the hammer to nail all global problems, from economic development in Africa to threats of transnational terrorism in the Middle East.” In addressing the internet’s ability to spread democracy abroad, he notes that “Cyber–utopians’ biggest conceptual mistake is treating cyberspace as some kind of anarchist zone, which the authorities dare not enter except to shut things down.” He notes that governments throughout history have manipulated new media like radio and film, and the internet is perhaps jus as easily susceptible to manipulation. (read more from Morozov on his blog)

If the internet’s vaunted blogs, social networking and information databases cannot act as a democratic panacea abroad, what are its prospects in the United States, where we remain fairly confident that the net will remain free of manipulation by government or other powerful interests? Here too the myth of the net as flat and anarchical breaks down, for as an online Boston Review article notes, “Web and blog traffic follow a power–law distribution, with a small number of sites drawing the lion’s share of the traffic.” This begs the question, is the internet really democratizing?

Here the notion of the internet as inherently democratic (because it offers an equal voice to all) needs more precision. Just as we cannot assume the internet is free from manipulation, we cannot assume that the predominance of certain voices is problematic. Although just as with old media, online some voices are heard more than others, the internet lacks the high barriers to entry of television, radio and print journalism. The infrastructural costs of those media gate the entrance to the public forum. Online, the lack of barriers allows any voice to be heard – that readers deem worthy of being heard.

New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller, speaking at Stanford recently, compared the influence of online media to the appearance of the printing press. Suddenly a deluge of books were being printed by those outside the old elite that hand-printed them, resulting in a crisis of confidence as no one knew who could be trusted. The same could be said today with the advent of the net, and already we can see certain blogs emerging from the ranks as well-respected sources. Unsurprisingly, many of these bloggers are those whose voices would still be heard without or before the net: individuals trained in journalism, university professors, etc. Only this time, citizens from Mumbai can report directly on their experiences, or a knowledgeable Iranian can present information that has the power to diversify the typical public forum in America. And that could make all the difference.