Artificial legitimacy?

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Abstract

This essay aims to explore the tensions between digital communication and legitimation by procedures within the framework of a sociology of artificial communication. First, it reconstructs the emergence of the digital medium among society's means of propagation. Then, it establishes the medial and operational relationship between digital and artificial communication. Then, it examines and compares the communicative possibilities of digital and artificial communication. Our analysis reveals technical, temporal, and participatory differences in how digital and artificial communication are integrated into judicial, electoral, parliamentary, and administrative organizations that are responsible for making and implementing collectively binding decisions. These differences are relevant for characterizing the distinct challenges each poses to procedural legitimacy.

Keywords:

artificial intelligence , social systems theory , digital communication , legitimation , procedures

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