Article
This working paper aims to articulate an interdisciplinary research and practice area focused around bridging systems.
Divisiveness appears to be increasing in much of the world. This can lead to concern about political violence and a decreasing capacity to collaboratively address large-scale societal challenges. In this working paper we aim to articulate an interdisciplinary research and practice area focused around what we call bridging systems. These are systems which increase mutual understanding and trust across divides, creating space for productive conflict, deliberation, or cooperation.
We give examples of bridging systems across three domains: recommender systems on social media, software for conducting civic forums, and human-facilitated group deliberation. We argue that these examples can be more meaningfully understood as processes for attention-allocation (as opposed to “content distribution” or “amplification”). Further, we develop a corresponding framework to explore similarities – and opportunities for bridging – across these seemingly disparate domains. In particular, we focus on the potential of bridging-based ranking to bring the benefits of offline bridging into spaces which are already governed by algorithms. Throughout, we suggest research directions that could improve our capacity to incorporate bridging into a world increasingly mediated by algorithms and artificial intelligence.
Additional Resource
GETTING-Plurality Research Network members Allison Stanger and Woojin Lim, along with other authors, published “Terra Incognita: The Governance of Artificial Intelligence in Global Perspective” in the Annual Review of Political Science.
Video
The GETTING-Plurality Research Network at the Ash Center’s Allen Lab and Connection Science at MIT Media Lab hosted a webinar event focused on “AI and the Future of Privacy”. In this session, we hear from Bruce Schneier, security technologist, and Faculty Affiliate at the Ash Center; Sarah Roth-Gaudette, Executive Director of Fight for the Future; and Tobin South, MIT Ph.D. Candidate and Fulbright Scholar. Each presenter gives a lightning talk, followed by audience Q&A.
Policy Brief
We face a fundamental question: is the very pursuit of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) the kind of aim democracies should allow?
