Research Paper
The first research paper presents the research programme and the expected work of the SOCAI centre. The actual research subject, the methodology, an agenda and the individual research fields are described in more detail. The author and director of the SOCAI Centre, Dr. David Roth-Isigkeit, offers an overview of the questions and challenges facing modern societies as a result of the digital transformation.
key words: digital transformation, artificial intelligence, information technology, social change, technical progress
Social Implications of Artificial Intelligence – A Research Programme
on Digital Transformation (engl.)
In our research paper (no. 2), Luise Müller considers the normative dimension of socially deploying AI from a perspective of justice, and asks about the possibilities and problems of such a perspective.
key words: justice, Artificial Intelligence, ethical AI, social change, machine ethics
Democracy in its current form is arguably ill-prepared to create a level playing field between public and private spheres. Big data processing is dominated by a handful of private corporations, including (information) intermediaries with significant market capitalizations, enabling these entities to engage in predatory pricing and other practices with the ultimate goal of contribution to the increase of their market share and shareholders' value. Furthermore, the lobbying and negotiating power of these corporations towards governments relate to the provision of advanced technological services, creating technical know-how and expertise dependency. Private actors thereby assume functions of public ordering.
This chapter argues that the resulting challenges for the regulation of the global information order are not constitutional but rather administrative. In the resulting legal space, a variety of public and private actors produce legal acts with external effects on states and individuals through rule generation, interpretation and application that are not subject to judicial review.
One of the central legitimation problems of this global administrative space stems from the lack in accountability, transparency and participation. Administrative law principles could provide for criteria for a review of this normative output, without necessarily having to relate back to the legitimacy chain that starts with a constituted demos. These lower demands make the design and control of review procedures easier to achieve. Referring to administrative law vocabulary, similar to constitutional discourse, entails the hope to be able to connect to conceptual debates in domestic law to understand phenomena of technology law beyond the state.
Index Terms: global information law, legitimacy, public order, administrative law
