The co-founder of Global Voices discusses the nexus between governments, internet companies and citizens.
In this interview, Rebecca MacKinnon, co-founder of Global Voices and author of Consent of the Networked, covers a range of topics from internet censorship and surveillance to copyright infringement. MacKinnon points to the transformation of a citizen’s relationship with their government, which today is mediated through a variety of digital services and platforms. She poses this question: “How do we ensure that the internet evolves in a way that is compatible with citizen empowerment, that is compatible with human rights, civil liberties and democracy?” In addition, government’s relationships with digital platforms is a complicated one: “Sometimes adversarial, sometimes symbiotic, sometimes co-dependent.”
