Engineering consent and digital-age democracy

It was a great idea. At a cabinet meeting, the president approved an ingenious plan to influence the outcome of the upcoming election of an adversarial state. We agreed that a number of factors had to fall in place for our plan to work.

First, we had to find a populist leader with great wealth and influence. On our shortlist were people we had a dirt on. During their visits to our country, we easily engineered opportunities with the oldest trick in the book: sexual temptation. All these little adventures were filmed and stored for a rainy day.

The second part of our plan was to gain access to our adversary’s electoral technology. They largely used electronic voting machines and it was easier than we anticipated to gain access to their secure networks.

Third — and this was the keystone — we plan to employ algorithmic weapons to spread misinformation and manipulate public opinion. The proliferation of smartphone technology and social media platforms enable the opportunity to deliver customised news stories direct to households, underpinned by behavioural psychology and mass indoctrination.

Thankfully this is a little story I chose to write. Imagine this was possible? Or, have we not seen something similar? Many have opinions about the previous US president and alleged foreign influence on his election and administration.

In 1947 Edward Bernays published an essay The Engineering of Consent. He argued that the US constitution guaranteed freedom for constituent groups to influence public opinion. Political groups use modern communications and mass media to increase the public’s familiarity with leaders and can therefore mould perception.

Of importance here is the idea that governments use these ideas to remain in power. If the public’s opinions are to control the government, the government must not control the public’s opinions. In The Consent of the Governed, John C Livingston and Robert G Thompson wrote: “Consent that is thus engineered is difficult to distinguish in any fundamental way from the consent that supports modern totalitarian governments.”

The smart technology era is revolutionising the way voters receive information and make their will known. Some believe that digital democracy will result in transparency and accountability from politicians. Because of this, it is more likely that policies will more closely represent the desires of the population. Citizens can now present petitions to their government, start projects online, vote electronically, and even replace their legislature, thanks to the internet.

Pessimists say that unlike the traditional way of representatives meeting in person to settle issues, cheaper and faster communication can lead to more unpredictable and poorly considered policy choices.

Voters mark their cross on a sheet of paper behind a curtain at a polling station during elections. Electronic voting, it is feared, may not safeguard the privacy of choice. Voters have no way of knowing how computerised voting machines work because they are shielded from public view. Election observers who empty ballot boxes in the presence of election monitors are absent in electronic voting.

Propaganda has entered the age of social media, making it easier to engineer consent on a huge scale. One is left to wonder if the foundations of democracy will remain standing.