Abstract
The post-Westphalian Nation State developed by becoming more and more an Information Society. However, in so doing, it progressively made itself less and less the main information agent, because what made the Nation State possible and then predominant, as a historical driving force in human politics, namely ICTs, is also what is now making it less central, in the social, political and economic life of humanity across the world. ICTs fluidify the topology of politics. They do not merely enable but actually promote (through management and empowerment) the agile, temporary and timely aggregation, disaggregation and re-aggregation of distributed groups around shared interests across old, rigid boundaries represented by social classes, political parties, ethnicity, language barriers, physical barriers, and so forth. This is generating a new tension between the Nation State, still understood as a major organisational institution, yet no longer monolithic but increasingly morphing into a multiagent system itself, and a variety of equally powerful, indeed sometimes even more politically influential and powerful, non-Statal organisations. Geo-politics is now global and increasingly non-territorial, but the Nation State still defines its identity and political legitimacy in terms of a sovereign territorial unit, as a Country. Such tension calls for a serious exercise in conceptual re-engineering: how should the new informational multiagent systems (MASs) be designed in such a way as to take full advantage of the socio-political progress made so far, while being able to deal successfully with the new global challenges (from the environment to the financial markets) that are undermining the legacy of that very progress? In the lecture, I shall defend an answer to this question in terms of a design of political MAS based on principles borrowed from information ethics.
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Notes
- 1.
This is defined as the value of financial assets plus real assets (mainly housing) owned by individuals, less their debts.
- 2.
Source: The Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report 2011, available online.
- 3.
Source: Nielsen Global AdView Pulse Q4 2011, available online.
- 4.
Source: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Military Expenditure Database, available online.
- 5.
Source: PricewaterhouseCoopers, Global Entertainment and Media Outlook 2007–2011, available online.
- 6.
Source: IDC, Worldwide IT Spending Patterns: The Worldwide Black Book, available online.
- 7.
Using standard vocabulary, by nation I refer to a socio-cultural entity comprising people united by language and culture. By state, I refer to a political entity that has a permanent population, a defined territory, a government, and the capacity to enter into relations with other states (Montevideo Convention 1933). The kurds are a typical example of a nation without a state.
- 8.
The Latin word means “estimate”. Already the Romans, who were well aware of the importance of information and communication in such a large empire for administrative and taxing purposes, carried out a census every 5 years.
- 9.
Williamson (1993, pp. 1329–1336).
- 10.
Anderson and Cavanagh (2000).
- 11.
- 12.
On volunteerism see United Nations (2011). State of the World’s Volunteerism Report, 2011: Universal Values for Global Well-being, United Nations Volunteers., on digital activism, the Digital Activism Research Project (http://digital-activism.org/) offers a wealth of information.
- 13.
I use the expression here in the post-Hegelian sense of non-political society.
- 14.
The social space where people can meet, identify and discuss societal problems, shaping political actions.
- 15.
Rawls (1999).
- 16.
For a more detailed analysis see Floridi (2012).
- 17.
Source: The New Atlantis report, available online.
- 18.
Source: Press release, Digital Agenda: cyber-security experts test defences in first pan-European simulation, available online.
- 19.
The Economist (2012).
- 20.
Floridi (1999).
- 21.
For a study of how current international law applies to cyber conflicts and cyber warfare, see NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (2013).
- 22.
The Economist (2007).
- 23.
Source: The Wilson Quarterly, report available online.
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Floridi, L. (2014). The Rise of the MASs. In: Floridi, L. (eds) Protection of Information and the Right to Privacy - A New Equilibrium?. Law, Governance and Technology Series, vol 17. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05720-0_6
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