David Pozen — Authoritarian Constitutionalism Inwards Facebookland

Some issues involved inward "content moderation" on social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.).

Perhaps Facebook’s content moderation authorities is less similar a mutual police pull organization than similar a organization of authoritarian or absolutist constitutionalism. Authoritarian constitutionalism, every bit Alexander Somek describes it, accepts many governance features of constitutional republic “with the noteworthy exception of … republic itself.” The absence of meaningful democratic accountability is justified “by pointing to a goal—the destination of social integration”—whose attainment would allegedly “be seriously undermined if co-operation were sought amongst [the legislature] or civil society.” Absolutist constitutionalism, inward Mark Tushnet’s formulation, occurs when “a unmarried decisionmaker motivated past times an involvement inward the nation’s well-being consults widely together with protects civil liberties generally, but inward the end, decides on a course of written report of activity inward the decisionmaker’s sole discretion, unchecked past times whatever other institutions.”

The analogy to authoritarian/absolutist constitutionalism calls attending to the high stakes of Facebook’s regulatory choices together with to the awesome might the fellowship wields over its digital subjects every bit a “sovereign” of cyberspace. It every bit good foregrounds the tension betwixt Facebook’s seemingly sincere trace of piece of job for costless speech communication values together with its explicit aspiration to brand users experience socially security together with “connected” (and thence to maximize the fourth dimension they pass on the site), a tension that is shaped past times marketplace forces but ultimately resolved past times benevolent leader together with controlling shareholder Zuckerberg....

Balkinization
Authoritarian Constitutionalism inward Facebookland
David Pozen | Professor of Law at Columbia Law School