Statement of Future Research

Background and Motivation

Two decades into the 21st Century, penetration of Information and Communication
Technologies, availability of big data and advent of technologies like machine learning and
Artificial Intelligence is a pervasive reality. Industry 4.0., i.e. the fourth industrial revolution is the
buzzword in industry, government, academia and civil society. It is interesting to note however
that in an age where “data is the new oil” (Humby, 2006), the frontiers of economic and political
powers (Zuboff, 2019) are tilting in direction of those who has access to this large-scale data.
There is an “extraction, prediction and execution architecture” (Maly, 2019) at work for narrow
self-interest motivated economic (Looney, Jacobson, & Redding, 2011; Martin & Murphy, 2017)
and political (Safiullah, Pathak, Singh & Anshul, 2017) gains. Because of this new forms of social
injustice (Cinnamon, 2017) is emerging in the current era.

The most interesting point to note here is that since ‘private human experience’ (Zuboff, 2019) is
now traded by private corporations and qualified by governments to determine the nature and
degree of citizenship. This causes a new kind of disenchantment among humans and i.e.
concerning their own behavior both in private and public lives. The way, in which compromise is
taking place between the government, private entities and larger public realm, seeds of a
totalitarian society (Hagtvet, 2001) are visible. This poses a threat to the democratic ideals and to
the norms of participation in a public sphere (Susen, 2011).

Research Interests

The technologies of the Industry 4.0. hold a lot of promise and are inevitable (Zhong, Xu, Klotz
& Newman, 2017; Dwivedi, Hughes, Ismagilova, Aarts, Coombs, Crick, ... & Galanos, 2019).
What needs to be thought of however is the following:

1. What are the limitations of current institutions and systems, which lead them to deviate away
from democratic values?

2. What kinds of institutions of governance need to be evolved in India for the big data for its
use in a manner that reinforce the democratic ideals?

3. What role government, civil society, citizenry and private entities must assume in this
endeavour?

4. How do you negotiate, rank and position the values of equity, effectiveness, efficiency, security
etc. in contemporary developmental debates in India?

These seem to me very pertinent questions for investigation in the next few decades having
practical implication and relevance for the functioning and fruition of democratic societies and
policy. In this vein, I propose to investigate the afore-mentioned questions in the next few years
as a research endeavor.
 References

Cinnamon, J. (2017). Social injustice in surveillance capitalism. Surveillance & Society, 15(5), 609-
625.

Dwivedi, Y. K., Hughes, L., Ismagilova, E., Aarts, G., Coombs, C., Crick, T., ... & Galanos, V.
(2019). Artificial Intelligence (AI): Multidisciplinary perspectives on emerging challenges,
opportunities, and agenda for research, practice and policy. International Journal of Information
Management, 101994.

Hagtvet, B. (2001). The Totalitarian Society: A Rendezvous with the Theory of the Totalitarian
Society and the Birth of the Ideas of Human Rights. Mennesker og Rettigheter, 19, 11.

Humby, C. (2006). Data is the new oil. Proc. ANA Sr. Marketer’s Summit. Evanston, IL, USA.

Looney, H. F., Jacobson, M., & Redding, M. J. (2011). U.S. Patent No. 7,925,549. Washington,
DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

Maly, I. (2019). The age of surveillance capitalism-Shoshana Zuboff. Diggit Magazine.

Martin, K. D., & Murphy, P. E. (2017). The role of data privacy in marketing. Journal of the
Academy of Marketing Science, 45(2), 135-155.

Safiullah, M., Pathak, P., Singh, S., & Anshul, A. (2017). Social media as an upcoming tool for
political marketing effectiveness. Asia Pacific Management Review, 22(1), 10-15.

Susen, S. (2011). Critical notes on Habermas's theory of the public sphere. Sociological Analysis,
5(1), 37-62.

Zhong, R. Y., Xu, X., Klotz, E., & Newman, S. T. (2017). Intelligent manufacturing in the
context of industry 4.0: a review. Engineering, 3(5), 616-630.

Zuboff, S. (2019). The age of surveillance capitalism: The fight for a human future at the new
frontier of power. Profile Books.