The idea is that human discourse and society have always been organized by a “social mediation ecosystem” that is dynamically and organically polycentric. We need to re-form social media to support that, not destroy it.
Are you aware there was a second public space for democratic discussions in ancient Athens, the Pnyx, with very different public architecture of the space? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pnyx
The shape https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Plan_Pnyx_colored.svg is more similar to Senate or second chamber parliamentary buildings in some states now. I've been noticing how the shape of a space influences people's social psychology and thinking about this since 2016, and recently came across this special collection in European Journal of Political Theory which aligns with some of my hunches- van Leeuwen, B. (2024). Is architecture relevant for political theory? *European Journal of Political Theory, 23*(1), 116-124. https://doi.org/10.1177/14748851211063672
Yes, this idea of dynamic polycentrism is a very promising direction for re-forming social media.
Very much in the spirit of part 3 of my series in Tech Policy Press with Chris Riley: Community and Content Moderation in the Digital Public Hypersquare (https://www.techpolicy.press/community-and-content-moderation-in-the-digital-public-hypersquare/).
And for an outline of how we can make that can take shape, see A New, Broader, More Fundamental Case for Social Media Agent "Middleware" (https://ucm.teleshuttle.com/2023/11/a-new-broader-more-fundamental-case-for.html).
The idea is that human discourse and society have always been organized by a “social mediation ecosystem” that is dynamically and organically polycentric. We need to re-form social media to support that, not destroy it.
Are you aware there was a second public space for democratic discussions in ancient Athens, the Pnyx, with very different public architecture of the space? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pnyx
The shape https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Plan_Pnyx_colored.svg is more similar to Senate or second chamber parliamentary buildings in some states now. I've been noticing how the shape of a space influences people's social psychology and thinking about this since 2016, and recently came across this special collection in European Journal of Political Theory which aligns with some of my hunches- van Leeuwen, B. (2024). Is architecture relevant for political theory? *European Journal of Political Theory, 23*(1), 116-124. https://doi.org/10.1177/14748851211063672