Project title: Developmental Processes and Interactions in a Digital Society
Duration: 1. 1. 2024 – 31. 12. 2028
Coordinator: Institute for Social Morphogenesis
Project leader: Prof. Matej Makarovič, Ph.D.
Type of the project: Research and Development Project
Role of FIS: Applicant
Short Project Description:
The research programme addresses the mutual dialectical influence between technology and society: while digitalisation greatly affects human interactions, cognition, organisations, and institutions – their emergent settings influence back upon the development and implementation of technological innovation. Digital society faces exponential technological revolutions, which have begun in terms of artificial intelligence, integrated reality, new energy matrix, digital governance, bioprogramming and neurogamification that refer to industry and economic development, political actions and governance, cultural encounters and everyday practices of human beings.
The research programme aims to holistically understand the challenges of digital society on all societal levels – and to consider it as a part of the regional and global developmental processes and interactions. The objective is to provide comprehensive and systematic research on:
– Macro level addressing governance challenges related to (1) the spread of disinformation and fake news, (2) increasing political divisions with the rise of extremism, (3) distrust in democratic institutions, (4) the digital divide with unequal access of different social groups to the tools of e-participation and e-deliberation, and (5) responses to international migrant flows. These interrelated challenges are both internal to a democratic society, covering socio-economic (different access to digital tools), cultural (ideological polarisation, extremism, authoritarian orientations) and political aspects (lack of transparency, abuse of power); and external to a democratic society, in a form of authoritarian global powers (manifesting in cyber-attacks, e-propaganda, disinformation etc).
– Mezzo level, with the focus on organisational structures and processes that encourage sustainable technological and social innovations, circular economy, participatory corporate governance, productivity and its value-based perceptions. It is addressed in terms of organisations connecting individuals and their interactions with the institutional environments. They include companies, NGOs, media, educational and research institutions, which have to enable effective responses to technology related risks. AI, big data and fusion between virtual and physical have raised a variety of issues that call for further exploration.
– Micro level, with the focus on (1) the impacts that digitalisation has on individuals’ interactions, cognition, attitudes, values, identities, creativity, productivity; (2) digital literacy, learning and reflexivity for individuals’ agency. Due to the time-space compression, accelerated digitalisation and mass communication, people have become increasingly embedded in novel social configurations and not‑yet‑tested solutions for effective action. The key concept for understanding the role of individuals in these novel social settings is reflexivity as an internal dialogue mediating between agency and structure.
The project is funded by:
