Technology monopolies have attained tremendous powers to shape what we see, who we hear from, or how we think, without any democratic accountability for that power. Technology has become a central form of power in society. This power must ultimately belong to the sovereign citizens of a technologized society.

Our Tech Pillar promotes an ambitious plan to achieve Technological Sovereignty: the right and capacity of citizens and democratic institutions to make self-determined choices regarding technologies and their innovation.

Digital Commonwealth

The establishment of a Digital Commonwealth in Europe will counter the power of platform monopolies by:

• Strengthening regulations on Data Protection (GDPR) and ePrivacy to limit involuntary data extraction;
• Enforcing mandatory cross-platform-interoperability and Portability of Data;
• Ensuring stronger EU antitrust laws and better enforcement; and
• Introducing the concept of Data Unions for collective representation.

Its infrastructure will be created by:

• Opening up and democratising algorithmic Automated Decision Making (often wrongly referred to as “artificial intelligence (AI)”) processes;
• Decommodifying data through the establishment of a public data commons;
• Creating a framework of digital rights for citizens; and
• Supporting alternative business models to democratise economic structures, such as platform cooperatives.

Democratising Innovation

Decisions about technology should not be irreversibly delegated to technocrats, corporations and tech monopolies — Europe can and must do better.

The policies proposed by DiEM25 call for new institutions and a participatory governance of technology. They include the development of technological citizenship in the 21st century, based on principles such as the commons, the capacity of self-organisation and the development of counter-power held by citizens and democratic institutions.

The Tech Pillar’s democratisation of innovation ensures that knowledge is shared in such a way as to benefit as many as possible. It will involve a reversal of the trend of socialising costs while privatising benefits of innovation, and the abolishment of monopolistic approaches to innovation.