How could the United Nations Global Digital Compact prevent cultural imposition and hermeneutical injustice?

Arthur Gwagwa*, Warmhold Jan Thomas Mollema

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalReview articlepeer-review

Abstract

As the geopolitical superpowers race to regulate the digital realm, their divergent rights-centered, market-driven, and social-control-based approaches require a global compact on digital regulation. If diverse regulatory jurisdictions remain, forms of domination entailed by cultural imposition and hermeneutical injustice related to AI legislation and AI systems will follow. We argue for consensual regulation on shared substantive issues, accompanied by proper standardization and coordination. Failure to attain consensus will fragment global digital regulation, enable regulatory capture by authoritarian powers or bad corporate actors, and deepen the historical geopolitical power asymmetries between the global South and the global North. To prevent an unjust regulatory landscape where the global South's cultural and hermeneutic resources are absent, two principles for the Global Digital Compact to counter these prospective harms are proposed and discussed: (1) “recognitive consensus on key substantive benefits and harms” and (2) “procedural consensus on global coordination and essential standards.”

Original languageEnglish
Article number101078
JournalPatterns
Volume5
Issue number11
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 8 Nov 2024

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2024 The Authors

Keywords

  • AI colonialism
  • AI ethics
  • AI governance
  • AI regulation
  • artificial intelligence
  • cultural imposition
  • domination
  • Global Digital Compact
  • hermeneutical injustice
  • United Nations

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