There is an old business anecdote about a tire company whose executives were trying to reduce costs by improving protective tire covers. After much discussion, a humble cleaner who had been listening to the conversation addressed the executives and asked, “Why worry about protecting the tires?” Everyone suddenly realized that the whole meeting was pointless, and the humble employee got promoted.
Sometimes I think similar pointless discussions are happening to justify the jobs of regulatory entities that are increasingly dictating what people can say online. The most recent argument1 I read in this vein says, more or less, the following: Regulators lack legitimacy because they are not elected. Nonetheless, inspired by deliberative democracy, we can require them to justify their decisions, making them somewhat more legitimate.
Considering the complexity of many subjects, it is easy to find justifications for opposing actions. Focusing on wording will only make people feel more excluded from decisions that directly affect their lives. Someone may argue that these justifications can at least be used against regulators in court if they are not coherent with their actions. But I suspect that most people wouldn't fight for their deleted posts and would simply move on with their lives.
Besides that, another thing worries me. Most of these politicians are prone to using sin taxes (taxes meant to deter behaviours like drinking or smoking) and other forms of social experimentation. How long will it take before regulators regard the public sphere as a field for implementing public policies?
For example, imagine there is a gas shortage. What should decent leaders do? Call a press conference and explain the situation to the people. Having this new toolset for manipulating public discourse, what would stop politicians from simply asking bureaucrats to press a button to boost social‑media posts telling citizens how brave they are if they start saving electricity?
What would stop them from using the same regulators to fight the extreme left/right (choose the one that applies to your country) or any other opponent?
Regulation should not be applied to activities that are essential to democracy, such as voting, forming associations, or getting informed. We can't treat them as traffic control or mining exploration.
Preferably we should not limit citizens' discourse, but if it is unavoidable, let it at least be done by democratically elected representatives. Otherwise we would be blurring the differences that distinguish democracy from authoritarian regimes.
In other words, we should draw a clear line and say: Regulatory State, you shall not pass.
- ( 2025/01/05/ ). Digital Regulation and Questions of Legitimacy. Publisher: Wiley, Notes: © 2025 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. (link) [ Journal Article ]