TY - CHAP
T1 - Democracy transfigured
T2 - The dawn of the ‘umpire state’
AU - Lehr, Peter
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2019.
PY - 2019
Y1 - 2019
N2 - In the previous chapter, I focussed on the state. However, answering the question on how modern security technology impacts on our liberal democracies requires a look at actors other than the state as well – actors that are per definition non-state actors but who, in some regard, act like quasi-state actors. In this chapter, I assess these private actors in a critical perspective to see how they influence our daily lives. My main argument, following James Madison, is that ‘the state’ as such is running the risk of being reduced to an ‘umpire state’ in the shape of a political actor who, as a primus inter pares (first among equals) mediates conflicts between private actors in the shape of powerful corporations but is no longer able to control their ‘quasi-feudal’ domains. But, since our ability to predict the future arguably is quite limited, I end this chapter with a couple of thought-provoking questions: could it be that this fear of many ‘Big Brothers’ instead of just one is as overblown as the fear of terrorism?
AB - In the previous chapter, I focussed on the state. However, answering the question on how modern security technology impacts on our liberal democracies requires a look at actors other than the state as well – actors that are per definition non-state actors but who, in some regard, act like quasi-state actors. In this chapter, I assess these private actors in a critical perspective to see how they influence our daily lives. My main argument, following James Madison, is that ‘the state’ as such is running the risk of being reduced to an ‘umpire state’ in the shape of a political actor who, as a primus inter pares (first among equals) mediates conflicts between private actors in the shape of powerful corporations but is no longer able to control their ‘quasi-feudal’ domains. But, since our ability to predict the future arguably is quite limited, I end this chapter with a couple of thought-provoking questions: could it be that this fear of many ‘Big Brothers’ instead of just one is as overblown as the fear of terrorism?
KW - Data-mining
KW - Outsourcing
KW - Private actors
KW - Private companies
KW - State actors
KW - Umpire State
KW - ‘Big brothers’
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85075816669&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/978-3-319-90924-0_14
DO - 10.1007/978-3-319-90924-0_14
M3 - Chapter
AN - SCOPUS:85075816669
T3 - Advanced Sciences and Technologies for Security Applications
SP - 181
EP - 189
BT - Advanced Sciences and Technologies for Security Applications
PB - Springer
ER -