Two horrible events, the COVID-19 pandemic and the killing of George Floyd, have shaken the world, raising consciousness about social, economic, and political problems that had been festering for generations. They could also inspire us to solve a relatively new problem with huge implications for democracy’s future: the growing role of surveillance in our lives.
You can revisit the conversation by watching the video. Below we have shared resources provided by our panelists on this subject. Please feel free to share this content with friends and colleagues.
Opinion Pieces
Further Reading
- Society in the Loop: Programming the Algorithmic Social Contract
- The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power
- Reality Mining of Mobile Communications: Toward A New Deal on Data
Iyad Rahwan, director of the Center for Humans and Machines at the Max Planck Institute for Human Development and former professor at the MIT Media Lab, was joined by William Powers, writer, journalist, and technologist and the author of “Hamlet’s BlackBerry: Building a Good Life in the Digital Age”, as they discussed their recent oped in the Boston Globe proposing ways to create a new social contract where technological tools can be used for good.
