DIGITAL EDUCATION

Digital Education? Bring It On!

The European Union pushes for a Digital Education Plan. Belatedly.

By Giota Bertsima

August 9, 2021

Shakuro

The Commission demands more transparency and responsibility from the social media platforms. Through the adoption of these frameworks, the EU engaged in a long race of safeguarding human rights and democratic values online, while combating the spread of untrustworthy information. Unfortunately, as ambitious and prosperous these frameworks might seem, they were proven to be quite controversial.

The attempt to impose a form of control on the digital sphere has created mixed feelings both for civil society and for the organizations advocating for free speech and access to information. The EU has offloaded much of the responsibility for content moderation to the platforms, while the vague distinction between illegal and harmful content has brought great confusion regarding the sources that should be accessible to users.

Additionally, the newly introduced co-regulating system is having even more implications for fundamental freedoms, as the private companies tend to over-comply with the demands of the institution resulting in the removal of potentially legal content from their platforms. In that sense, the issue that the EU is attempting to solve is actually reinforcing the problem in a different context. The Commission has long ago made its commitments to protect the freedom of expression in the effort to tackle disinformation and avoid any practice resembling censorship. At the end of the day, the principle of promoting fundamental freedoms is located at the core of the institution. However, the core is far from the surface and sometimes what lies underneath might be concealed and thus underprioritized.

The infodemic that accompanied the Covid-19 pandemic made matters even worse. WHO defined the infodemic as the spread of large bulks of unreliable sources, mainly in regards to the virus. The primary risk that used to derive from disinformation was the impact on democracy. Now, the costs of disinformation and fake news are actually counted in human lives, as the former was thereon posing a direct threat to public health. The lockdowns created a form of digital disruption that was accelerated at an astronomical pace. Under these circumstances, misleading information could reach everyone way easier than before.

At the face of these challenges and the shortcomings of the established practices against disinformation, the best approach would be to address the root of the problem. Firstly, by providing a proper digital education for the European society and secondly by embracing citizen participation in the decision-making process more actively. The Commission has actually come up with a very effective answer to the former.

The Digital Education Action Plan (DEAP) introduced in 2018 and updated in 2021, will concentrate on strengthening the areas of digital capacities for education and training systems, digital literacy, and competencies as well as the digital ecosystem of education content and tools.

As promising as this might sound, the plan should have been implemented several years ago. In the midst of the pandemic and the major changes that have been brought to our everyday lives and activities, educating and training citizens to navigate safely by enriching their critical thinking and ameliorating their filtering capacity, should have been a priority. Much of the frustration that was created due to the infodemic could have been avoided, had the Commission invested more in prevention rather than countering mechanisms. In that case, the EU’s a posteriori approach was not fruitful for containing the bulk of untrustworthy sources and acting as a shield.  Admittedly, the Internet is a chaotic environment that needs to be tamed under certain values and governed by the rule of law. Nevertheless, the digital sphere is simultaneously a great asset that democracy holds in its quiver. To this end, too much control can create a backsliding effect.

The second issue refers to citizen participation and equal representation. Alemanno in his recent article points out that “all individuals affected by a given EU action should be able to have an effective equal chance to “have a say” in the decision-making process”. Thus far, the public consultations are not as representative as they should be in a democratic system.

Adding to that, the Algorithmic Watch stipulates that the procedure of public consultations favors the private companies, while the lobbying games are also adding to this fact. In regards to the operations of the online world, the citizens should be at the center of the decision-making process and not mere actors who barely contribute to the policy formation. Many of the controversial provisions of the current policies that tackle disinformation could have turned out less consequential if the citizens participated more actively in the policy-making process. The content moderation mechanism might have been more effective and targeted, while the vague term ‘harmful content’ that features in the DSA may have been less ambiguous. What civil society needs is the 2021 DEAP. For the moment, the Plan is neither binding for the member states nor includes regulatory dimensions. Ceteris paribus, it should.

Moderate solutions are not enough to respond to the rapid changes taking place online. Will we be ready for another infodemic coming from a future historical event? Let that be a pandemic, a natural disaster, or a financial crisis. The future is always uncertain. After the Covid-19 crisis, we can’t simply go back to normality. We need to renegotiate the terms and conditions.  However, it remains a collective responsibility for the younger generations to create safeguards for responding to the challenges ahead and building the foundations for a just internet society.

Giota Bertsima is a senior student at Leiden University in the Advanced MSc in International Relations and Diplomacy. She holds a bachelor’s degree in Political Sciences from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. Her main interest lies in the field of AI and society, digital democracy and governance.