In modern societies media have a central role as it is through the media that citizens in particular have access to information about their society. Information about society is crucial for citizens to be able to make thoughtful decisions in a democratic spirit. Political campaigns have started using personally targeted online advertising to reach new voters. This phenomenon is called “microtargeting” and the purpose is to identify individual voters that the parties are most likely to convince. Cambridge Analyticas operations, which are largely based on microtargeting, challenge democratic principles. This study purpose is divided in two parts. First is to map out and explain Cambridge Analyticas operations by analyzing from a democratic perspective. Second is to compile and systematize the proposed measures on democracy problems that are brought up in the debate about Cambridge Analytica. Idea analysis is the method of this paper, and it is of both descriptive and explanatory nature. It appears that Cambridge Analytica operations mainly undermines citizens' right to enlightened understanding and a free and factual debate. This undermines democratic principles in several ways. Furthermore, the studies show that the debate orbits around antitrust laws, how the legislation should formulate on how internet companies should handle personal information and what is the Internet companies own obligation in question. A smaller part of the debate also highlights the citizens' own capacity to be vigilant and critical of the Internet.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:uu-408716 |
| Date | January 2020 |
| Creators | Strand, Ellinor |
| Publisher | Uppsala universitet, Statsvetenskapliga institutionen |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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