Social Europe

politics, economy and employment & labour

  • Themes
    • Strategic autonomy
    • War in Ukraine
    • European digital sphere
    • Recovery and resilience
  • Publications
    • Books
    • Dossiers
    • Occasional Papers
    • Research Essays
    • Brexit Paper Series
  • Podcast
  • Videos
  • Newsletter

A democratic model for Facebook

Henning Meyer 11th December 2018

b 6706.88

Henning Meyer

Facebook is regularly in the news as a force disrupting democratic politics across the globe but what if democracy could be the model to save Facebook?

The social network connecting 2.2 billion people has had a rocky time of late. From the alleged malevolent interference by foreign actors in the last US Presidential election via the Cambridge Analytica scandal to more recent data and document leaks, the company is usually making headline news for all the wrong reasons.

One of the most persistent problems Mark Zuckerberg’s company has had to deal with is hate speech. Indeed, some of the content distributed on Facebook bitterly divides societies and drives people apart rather than connecting them – the primary purpose of the social network (“making the world more open and connected” its founder says). Taking decisions about where to draw the line between controversial but legitimate views and inciting hatred is, however, not a straightforward task and the company has struggled to come to grips with rules and processes capable of handling the issue. One recent idea of Zuckerberg, however, could show the way to an interesting new model of corporate governance.

He wants to establish an independent appeals body, dubbed in the media a “Facebook Supreme Court”, for three major reasons. First, an external appeals body would take decisions away from Facebook itself. Second, it would create accountability and oversight. And, third, an independent body would ensure that decisions are not taken for commercial reasons but, rather, in the best interest of the Facebook community.

Court of appeal

The key point here is that Zuckerberg is in effect setting up an independent jurisdiction that is usually only found in democratic political systems. And such a move makes perfect sense for a company that is often described as akin to a global nation or as the modern equivalent of the public square of old. But is establishing an independent “court of appeal” enough for a company that has more users than any individual country’s citizens? Or could the slogan “give people the power”, which is core to Facebook’s mission, also mean that mimicking more democratic institutions in the corporate governance model of a company of Facebook’s unique size and scope is the way forward?


Our job is keeping you informed!


Subscribe to our free newsletter and stay up to date with the latest Social Europe content. We will never send you spam and you can unsubscribe anytime.

Sign up here

The problem with its community standards is not just enforcement but often the content of different policies themselves. Even if you consult broadly on what should be acceptable and what not, as Facebook does, the final decision is still made by the company itself. If Facebook not only set up a judicial institution but also crafted a digital legislative process empowering its users, the policies themselves would have a different source of legitimacy and would truly “give people the power”.

Creating such a process is of course not straightforward as there are significant cultural differences amongst Facebook users. But none of the alternative options to address the company’s issues are easy either. Facebook has already announced that it is planning to allow for a degree of personal customisation in what content is shown to users but if personal customisation could be married with broader legitimacy of the underlying general policies the company might be on the right track.

It is no coincidence that the long-standing division of powers into executive, legislative and judicial branches has served democratic nations well. Maybe adopting this proven model for the governance of a corporation that has the hallmarks of a digital nation more than any other company on the planet is the way forward. Setting more legitimate policies by including users directly in the decision-making process and policing these policies proactively with better AI content filters and reactively by human intervention would be an interesting experiment. Especially if an appeals mechanism akin to an independent court were added on top.

At the very least it is worth exploring these new concepts of governance. The current model has clearly failed and it is hard to see how future failures can be avoided without institutional governance innovation. As Zuckerberg himself stated in his note on content governance and enforcement, these are issues that cannot be fixed for all time but merely improved upon. It is, however, much better to try to improve with the users than for the users.

Pics
Henning Meyer

Henning Meyer is Editor-in-Chief of Social Europe and a Research Associate of the Public Policy Group at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He is also Director of the consultancy New Global Strategy Ltd. and frequently writes opinion editorials for international newspapers such as The Guardian, DIE ZEIT, The New York Times and El Pais.

You are here: Home / Politics / A democratic model for Facebook

Most Popular Posts

Russian soldiers' mothers,war,Ukraine The Ukraine war and Russian soldiers’ mothersJennifer Mathers and Natasha Danilova
IGU,documents,International Gas Union,lobby,lobbying,sustainable finance taxonomy,green gas,EU,COP ‘Gaslighting’ Europe on fossil fuelsFaye Holder
Schengen,Fortress Europe,Romania,Bulgaria Romania and Bulgaria stuck in EU’s second tierMagdalena Ulceluse
income inequality,inequality,Gini,1 per cent,elephant chart,elephant Global income inequality: time to revise the elephantBranko Milanovic
Orbán,Hungary,Russia,Putin,sanctions,European Union,EU,European Parliament,commission,funds,funding Time to confront Europe’s rogue state—HungaryStephen Pogány

Most Recent Posts

reality check,EU foreign policy,Russia Russia’s invasion of Ukraine—a reality check for the EUHeidi Mauer, Richard Whitman and Nicholas Wright
permanent EU investment fund,Recovery and Resilience Facility,public investment,RRF Towards a permanent EU investment fundPhilipp Heimberger and Andreas Lichtenberger
sustainability,SDGs,Finland Embedding sustainability in a government programmeJohanna Juselius
social dialogue,social partners Social dialogue must be at the heart of Europe’s futureClaes-Mikael Ståhl
Jacinda Ardern,women,leadership,New Zealand What it means when Jacinda Ardern calls timePeter Davis

Other Social Europe Publications

front cover scaled Towards a social-democratic century?
Cover e1655225066994 National recovery and resilience plans
Untitled design The transatlantic relationship
Women Corona e1631700896969 500 Women and the coronavirus crisis
sere12 1 RE No. 12: Why No Economic Democracy in Sweden?

ILO advertisement

Global Wage Report 2022-23: The impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power

The International Labour Organization's Global Wage Report is a key reference on wages and wage inequality for the academic community and policy-makers around the world.

This eighth edition of the report, The Impact of inflation and COVID-19 on wages and purchasing power, examines the evolution of real wages, giving a unique picture of wage trends globally and by region. The report includes evidence on how wages have evolved through the COVID-19 crisis as well as how the current inflationary context is biting into real wage growth in most regions of the world. The report shows that for the first time in the 21st century real wage growth has fallen to negative values while, at the same time, the gap between real productivity growth and real wage growth continues to widen.

The report analysis the evolution of the real total wage bill from 2019 to 2022 to show how its different components—employment, nominal wages and inflation—have changed during the COVID-19 crisis and, more recently, during the cost-of-living crisis. The decomposition of the total wage bill, and its evolution, is shown for all wage employees and distinguishes between women and men. The report also looks at changes in wage inequality and the gender pay gap to reveal how COVID-19 may have contributed to increasing income inequality in different regions of the world. Together, the empirical evidence in the report becomes the backbone of a policy discussion that could play a key role in a human-centred recovery from the different ongoing crises.


DOWNLOAD HERE

ETUI advertisement

The EU recovery strategy: a blueprint for a more Social Europe or a house of cards?

This new ETUI paper explores the European Union recovery strategy, with a focus on its potentially transformative aspects vis-à-vis European integration and its implications for the social dimension of the EU’s socio-economic governance. In particular, it reflects on whether the agreed measures provide sufficient safeguards against the spectre of austerity and whether these constitute steps away from treating social and labour policies as mere ‘variables’ of economic growth.


DOWNLOAD HERE

Eurofound advertisement

Eurofound webinar: Making telework work for everyone

Since 2020 more European workers and managers have enjoyed greater flexibility and autonomy in work and are reporting their preference for hybrid working. Also driven by technological developments and structural changes in employment, organisations are now integrating telework more permanently into their workplace.

To reflect on these shifts, on 6 December Eurofound researchers Oscar Vargas and John Hurley explored the challenges and opportunities of the surge in telework, as well as the overall growth of telework and teleworkable jobs in the EU and what this means for workers, managers, companies and policymakers.


WATCH THE WEBINAR HERE

Foundation for European Progressive Studies Advertisement

The winter issue of the Progressive Post magazine from FEPS is out!

The sequence of recent catastrophes has thrust new words into our vocabulary—'polycrisis', for example, even 'permacrisis'. These challenges have multiple origins, reinforce each other and cannot be tackled individually. But could they also be opportunities for the EU?

This issue offers compelling analyses on the European health union, multilateralism and international co-operation, the state of the union, political alternatives to the narrative imposed by the right and much more!


DOWNLOAD HERE

Hans Böckler Stiftung Advertisement

The macroeconomic effects of re-applying the EU fiscal rules

Against the background of the European Commission's reform plans for the Stability and Growth Pact (SGP), this policy brief uses the macroeconometric multi-country model NiGEM to simulate the macroeconomic implications of the most relevant reform options from 2024 onwards. Next to a return to the existing and unreformed rules, the most prominent options include an expenditure rule linked to a debt anchor.

Our results for the euro area and its four biggest economies—France, Italy, Germany and Spain—indicate that returning to the rules of the SGP would lead to severe cuts in public spending, particularly if the SGP rules were interpreted as in the past. A more flexible interpretation would only somewhat ease the fiscal-adjustment burden. An expenditure rule along the lines of the European Fiscal Board would, however, not necessarily alleviate that burden in and of itself.

Our simulations show great care must be taken to specify the expenditure rule, such that fiscal consolidation is achieved in a growth-friendly way. Raising the debt ceiling to 90 per cent of gross domestic product and applying less demanding fiscal adjustments, as proposed by the IMK, would go a long way.


DOWNLOAD HERE

About Social Europe

Our Mission

Article Submission

Membership

Advertisements

Legal Disclosure

Privacy Policy

Copyright

Social Europe ISSN 2628-7641

Social Europe Archives

Search Social Europe

Themes Archive

Politics Archive

Economy Archive

Society Archive

Ecology Archive

Follow us

RSS Feed

Follow us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Follow us on LinkedIn

Follow us on YouTube