Artificial Intelligence and New Technologies in Democratic Innovations: Boom or Doom?

Abstract

AI and other digital technologies have developed in leaps in recent years. These developing technologies have provided new areas of investigation also for scholars and practitioners of democratic innovations. On the one hand, new technologies could support democratic innovations, for instance, by making laborious deliberation processes more (cost-)efficient. On the other hand, there are potential hazards and obstacles AI tools might cause, like reinforcing existing discriminatory biases in decision-making. Questions that new technologies prompt for the field include, for example: What kind of functions could large-language models (LLMs) serve in different institutions? Is AI capable of democratic deliberation? Could algorithmic governance improve political decision-making? Are these types of technologies perceived as legitimate tools to be embedded into democratic processes? For scholars of democracy, it is vital to map potential applications and as well as scrutinise the impacts AI and other new technologies have on different democratic innovations. Do they promise boom or doom? The panel concentrates on all aspects of AI and new technologies and their associations with democratic innovations. We welcome both theoretical and empirical contributions.

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