Disempowerment and Loss of Human Agency
Disempowerment and loss of human agency: In our technologically- oriented society, almost every action we are able to take (what ethicists call our ‘agency’) is mediated, either through technology, such as computers, phones etc., or through third parties, such as banks, the retail supply chain, telcos, Internet service providers, identity providers, and so on. Ethically, the fact that what we do is mediated often moves us further from the
consequences of our decisions and actions. Even more fundamentally, the prevalence of technology-mediated phenomena distances us from societal norms such as equality, fairness, and justice, and so challenges our core understanding of what it means to be human. The asymmetry in power between individuals/users and service providers (both commercial and public) leaves us feeling disempowered and that we are losing our human agency. Can we design systems that empower users and so restore human agency, and what does this mean in reality?
