The backlash of digitalisation – a red-hot topic
2024-10-01It is referred to as “digital backlash” – the dissatisfaction with what our digital existence has become. Karin Fast, professor of media and communication studies, is one of the editors of the new book “The Digital Backlash and the Paradoxes of Disconnection”.
Karin Fast, please explain “digital backlash”
– We use the term to highlight new trends in society, with a focus on the Scandinavian countries, which stem from dissatisfaction with the way in which our digital existence has evolved. Our book captures two clear main tracks in the debate about digitalisation today. One is about how we are increasingly tied to digital tools in our everyday lives. For purely practical reasons, it is becoming increasingly difficult for most of us to put the phone away. The second track revolves around the business models and ethics of platform companies, where social media is designed to capture, hold and monetise our attention.
– What we have seen in the last ten years is a series of reactions against all of this – the actual “backlash”. Both individuals and social actors problematise the downsides of digitalisation and seek new approaches. It is this development, in different guises, that our book is about. We pay attention to new ways of thinking about, talking about and using the most common digital tools. The focus is on voluntary forms of “digital disconnection”.
Why is this important and interesting?
– Our book contributes important nuances to the debate on digitalisation and explains why digital media can be seen as paradoxical: they are liberating and captivating at the same time.
– The book includes criticism of digital capitalism and highlights the mechanisms that make us more tied to our digital media than we might wish to be. But it also problematises the backlash itself, for example how “digital well-being” tends to be made into a problem at the individual level, and how new forms of inequality are created in a society where people’s opportunities to “disconnect” vary greatly.
– Today, digital disconnection is becoming a form of new class marker, and anyone who uses their mobile “too much” can both feel and be seen as a failed individual. Such approaches can in turn obscure things, such as the responsibility of tech companies or politicians to create a fair digital world.
Can you mention something about your conclusions?
– The book shows how digital reflection is becoming an increasingly natural part of our lives. The chapters that focus how people use digital media show that many – from professional politicians to young people – adopt a range of everyday “micro-tactics” to avoid digital stress, digital distractions and similar problems. It can be about hiding your mobile behind the curtain to create a sense of distance, turning off the sound or leaving it outside the bedroom. We see this type of media use as typical of our “post-digital age”, where digital media are here to stay.
One of the most important contributions of the book is that it highlights the inequalities present in our digital society. For a chronically ill person who depends on digital medical tools for their health, or a food delivery worker whose entire livelihood depends on an app, it can be very difficult, if not impossible, to adopt peppy advice about “digital detox”. For others, like the “alternative” tourist, disconnection can be an exciting, and status-enhancing, adventure.
The Swedish Public Health Agency recently recommended that children should spend less time in front of screens – is there anything in your book that touches on that?
– We don’t make any statements in the book about whether people should increase or decrease their screen time. We are more curious about the social discourse itself and the norms it creates. The book is highly relevant in light of the debate about children’s screen time, and even if we didn’t catch the debate specifically around the latest screen time recommendations from the Public Health Agency, we recognise tracks and themes from other, similar, debates. The book includes a chapter that looks at the debate surrounding the “mobilephone box”, which was announced as Christmas gift of the year in Sweden in 2019. Similar to the current guidelines on screen time, the introduction of the mobilephone box sparked intense reactions from both advocates and critics. Another chapter shows how the Swedish debate has come to revolve around neurological effects – how excessive screen use can be harmful to the brain – rather than social consequences. One of the contributions of the book is to show how today’s public debate bears traces of yesterday’s media criticism.
The optimism surrounding digitalisation was enormous, why do you think there has been a setback – and why now?
– There have always been concerns about new media, but in the 1990s, “the world wide web” was seen as the saviour of democracy. Today, this image has been undermined by online hate, “fake news”, online fraud and various other problems. At the same time, our freedom of choice to opt out of the digital world has decreased. I believe the backlash is based on people feeling that they are losing their autonomy. It can feel like the media is controlling us, rather than the other way around. And as the ties between humans and technology tighten, the dissatisfaction and longing to break free grow.
How would you describe the interest in these issues?
– This is a red-hot topic at the moment, both in terms of media attention and in our role as researchers. As researchers, we encounter a lot of curiosity from both the public and experts, and we have been invited to give talks on the subject by various actors of society – from the Ministry of Culture and libraries to other research environments. Many people share similar feelings about the downsides of digitalisation, and there is a lot of interest in discussing moral aspects and issues.