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The power of the net: new challenges for leaders

    • Rome
    • 13 June 2012

          Opening up discussions at this national roundtable on the power of the web was the observation that the internet has changed the face of politics, especially in terms of the processes of building consensus and managing leadership. There were already clear signs of this in Barack Obama’s winning election campaign of 2008, with two million supporters marshaled via the net, 8 and a half million unique visitors to the main campaign website, 13 million newsletter subscribers and 30 million dollars raised in online donations. Yet the first digital president in history is no longer alone; today, there are many politicians who rely on the consensus-rallying potential offered by the internet, including candidates in the recent elections for the office of Mayor of London. More surprisingly, even the new French president Francois Hollande turned to the internet, despite living in a country with a well-entrenched political system built on a traditional political culture. Not so unexpectedly, so too have the Pirate Party in Germany and the so-called Five Star Movement (Movimento 5 Stelle) in Italy.

          It was noted that the web has thus become a key player in the modern democratic process, offering many opportunities but at some risk. By means of the net, citizens partake in a vast forum where issues are raised and solutions are sought. Some participants felt that this will lead straight to a disintermediation of the relationship between ordinary citizens and the political class, in a scenario of direct democracy yet to take clear shape. Not all those in attendance agreed with this view, however, observing that especially in Italy intermediary bodies will continue to have a role as gauges of social needs to transform into political demands.

          There was consensus, however, over the fact that the way of managing leadership is set to change. Indeed the internet, which by its very nature is fundamentally anarchic, calls into question the traditional model of authority and revives concepts such as reputation and accountability. The political leader is no longer a privileged collector of information later instrumental to decision-making. Today, the internet propagates and makes available to all information to which only a few were once privy. Leaders must therefore be able to select from and make sense of a huge volume of information on which to base their choices. At the same time, an increasingly greater number of “internet watchdogs” are constantly demanding that leaders be accountable and live up to and maintain their reputation.

          It was stressed, however, that the internet also poses serious risks for the future development of democratic systems. Indeed, the top 5 US digital companies today hold and manage such a mass of information as to foreshadow an enormous capacity on their part, in years to come, to steer and shape public opinion, thus endangering the foundations of democratic systems. In order to put the great power in the hands of such companies into perspective, it was pointed out that the capital holdings of a global company such as Apple are worth approximately those of the entire Italian stock market. It was therefore felt that new rules are needed, before a latter-day version of “Orwell’s Big Brother” becomes capable of governing the hearts and minds of the boundless masses plugged in to the internet.

          Another threat to democracy identified by the participants was seen as again stemming from the “anarchic” nature of the web. Plato taught that a world without structure is a very fertile ground for the emergence of despotism. At the same time, Enlightenment thinkers warned that misinformation is a danger to democracy, with Nazism and communism providing examples of this. A system left to itself and structureless thus poses threats to the democratic system. The participants therefore pointed to an urgent need to take stock of these risks and begin to envisage at least a modicum of regulation. According to some participants, a focus on rules is set to make a comeback in any case, suggesting that the patterns of behavior that “cyberwarfare” has brought with it will alone lead to greater controls and an evolution of the internet in a less anarchic direction.

          On the political front, in Italy and elsewhere, the last twenty years have witnessed the emergence of a leader-centric model, turning leaders into personalities and political engagement into a spectacle, and in which the medium of television has continued to play a key role. It was felt that the internet will perhaps not eliminate this leader-centric focus, but – whilst not resulting in a model of direct democracy – it will oblige a more participatory and shared model.

          Summing up, the participants noted that the internet is reshaping leadership roles and the political establishment. This change is well in progress, so much so that – according to many of those in attendance – there is already a new establishment that has learned to manage the online flow of information. Yet whilst it is true that information posted in real time on Twitter and other social networks becomes an unstoppable tide, it is also the case that mechanisms are already in place to generate opposing “waves”, designed and operated to respond with counter-information. All of which led the participants in conclusion to highlight, among other things, the important function of journalists, who even online will continue to have a role to play as “gatekeepers” of an otherwise unmanageable and overwhelming mass of information.