1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:02,873 Welcome to another episode of the Democracy Innovative Podcast and 2 00:00:02,873 --> 00:00:05,496 our guest of today is Alvaro Oleanoff. 3 00:00:05,496 --> 00:00:07,328 Thank you, Alvaro, for your time. 4 00:00:08,034 --> 00:00:09,311 Thanks, Alexander, for the invitation. 5 00:00:10,895 --> 00:00:13,861 Would you like to tell us something about you, 6 00:00:13,861 --> 00:00:17,538 your academic background or also your personal background? 7 00:00:18,362 --> 00:00:23,686 Yeah, so I am an academic researcher based in Brussels at the Université Libre 8 00:00:23,686 --> 00:00:27,620 de Bruxelles and I have worked a lot on social movements. 9 00:00:27,620 --> 00:00:32,052 did my PhD on the TTIP contestation and debates, 10 00:00:32,052 --> 00:00:36,036 the EU-US trade agreement that was negotiated about 10 years ago by the 11 00:00:36,036 --> 00:00:39,949 EU with the US. So I was very much interested in the relation between conflict 12 00:00:39,949 --> 00:00:42,111 and democracy. And more recently, 13 00:00:42,111 --> 00:00:43,612 I worked a lot on 14 00:00:43,976 --> 00:00:47,763 the participatory practices of the EU more concretely looking 15 00:00:47,763 --> 00:00:49,225 at European Citizens Initiative, 16 00:00:49,225 --> 00:00:51,799 the Conference on the Future of Europe or the European Citizen Panels. 17 00:00:55,033 --> 00:01:01,353 OK. And what have you discovered while you were working 18 00:01:01,353 --> 00:01:02,353 on these topics? 19 00:01:02,871 --> 00:01:06,444 Yeah, well, mean, I am quite, I mean, 20 00:01:06,444 --> 00:01:08,726 maybe disappointed is not the right question because maybe I 21 00:01:08,726 --> 00:01:12,449 was not necessarily expecting a lot from the EU in regards to participation. 22 00:01:12,449 --> 00:01:17,854 But it remains quite shocking the citizen watching practices that 23 00:01:17,854 --> 00:01:21,016 the ~ EU mobilizes in regards to participation. 24 00:01:21,016 --> 00:01:26,141 So how there is a very strategic deployment 25 00:01:26,221 --> 00:01:28,643 of so-called democratic innovations. 26 00:01:29,101 --> 00:01:34,778 to basically whitewash the policies that are mostly decided beforehand. 27 00:01:34,778 --> 00:01:39,443 And in this kind of process, there's actually not really much possibility 28 00:01:39,443 --> 00:01:43,697 of shaping the underlying philosophy with which these processes 29 00:01:43,697 --> 00:01:45,029 and policies are built. 30 00:01:46,985 --> 00:01:49,887 But where do you identify like the main issue? 31 00:01:49,887 --> 00:01:55,292 in the, because I can see the fact that just a 32 00:01:55,613 --> 00:02:01,077 few people are involved in citizen assemblies or maybe also the fact that 33 00:02:01,077 --> 00:02:05,551 the commitment. the output of a citizen assembly not always become, 34 00:02:05,551 --> 00:02:08,663 let's say the input of a policy. 35 00:02:09,913 --> 00:02:13,205 So I think that there's a problem with the process, 36 00:02:13,205 --> 00:02:16,546 not only with the output. I know that there's a lot of colleagues that have been 37 00:02:16,546 --> 00:02:18,626 making the argument about how, 38 00:02:18,626 --> 00:02:22,857 for example, citizens' assemblies need to be sort of like the output needs 39 00:02:22,857 --> 00:02:25,908 to be binding, right? And if the outcome is binding, 40 00:02:25,908 --> 00:02:29,049 then this will improve the democratic legitimacy of these processes. 41 00:02:29,049 --> 00:02:33,190 I am really not convinced about this because the process itself 42 00:02:33,190 --> 00:02:37,561 and underlying philosophy with which citizen assemblies are conceived 43 00:02:37,925 --> 00:02:40,697 I think is problematic because it's in most of the cases, 44 00:02:40,697 --> 00:02:47,360 beginning from a very depoliticized conception of democracy that sidelines 45 00:02:47,480 --> 00:02:50,821 the actors that I think are central to any democratic process, 46 00:02:50,821 --> 00:02:53,222 which are collective actors, trade unions, 47 00:02:53,222 --> 00:02:56,584 mass political parties, and mass politics more generally. 48 00:02:56,584 --> 00:02:59,396 And I think in most of these citizen assemblies, 49 00:02:59,396 --> 00:03:03,058 and I have studied primarily the ones taking place at the European level, 50 00:03:03,540 --> 00:03:07,792 So I know that the citizen assemblies taking place at the national level, 51 00:03:07,792 --> 00:03:11,493 sometimes there are some specificities that make them ~ a little 52 00:03:11,493 --> 00:03:13,164 bit more legitimate. Like I'm thinking, 53 00:03:13,164 --> 00:03:15,405 for example, about the French Convention, 54 00:03:15,405 --> 00:03:16,806 Citizen Convention on Climate, 55 00:03:16,806 --> 00:03:19,207 that actually triggered quite a lot of public debate. 56 00:03:19,207 --> 00:03:20,687 And I thought that was very interesting. 57 00:03:20,687 --> 00:03:24,568 So to me, the assembly itself was good in so far, 58 00:03:24,568 --> 00:03:27,970 it was able to have an impact in public debates. 59 00:03:27,970 --> 00:03:28,970 ~ 60 00:03:28,850 --> 00:03:32,214 But in most of the cases, these citizen assemblies go completely under 61 00:03:32,214 --> 00:03:36,749 the radar of public debates and are simply used by institutions 62 00:03:36,749 --> 00:03:38,721 to legitimize their positions, 63 00:03:38,721 --> 00:03:40,643 which I find very deeply problematic. 64 00:03:42,956 --> 00:03:46,580 And so how can be this problem fixed? 65 00:03:46,580 --> 00:03:49,743 Because you mentioned that the process is the problem. 66 00:03:49,743 --> 00:03:53,947 so connecting the Citizen Assembly maybe to some social movement, 67 00:03:53,947 --> 00:03:56,890 you mentioned, I don't know, maybe political parties, 68 00:03:56,890 --> 00:03:57,890 maybe... 69 00:03:59,157 --> 00:04:03,519 Yeah, I am not particularly favorable to the idea of citizen assembly, 70 00:04:03,519 --> 00:04:07,791 so I am not sure that the fix is how to connect better citizen assemblies 71 00:04:07,791 --> 00:04:12,572 to social movements. I think to begin as thinking that citizen assemblies 72 00:04:12,572 --> 00:04:14,713 are the solution is part of the problem. 73 00:04:14,713 --> 00:04:21,516 And I think, okay, what are the real or what are the kind of causes that 74 00:04:21,516 --> 00:04:22,977 we have ~ in which 75 00:04:23,501 --> 00:04:29,093 We see that democracy ~ is at risk or that we have democratic regression. 76 00:04:29,093 --> 00:04:32,865 What are the causes? Is the cause that there are no citizen assemblies 77 00:04:32,865 --> 00:04:34,536 or that there are no more citizen assemblies? 78 00:04:34,536 --> 00:04:36,947 I am not really convinced about that. 79 00:04:36,947 --> 00:04:40,118 Is the cause more related to, for instance, 80 00:04:40,118 --> 00:04:43,669 the ~ political infrastructure of political parties, 81 00:04:43,669 --> 00:04:48,671 of trade unions? I think that is where I start seeing a little bit some 82 00:04:48,671 --> 00:04:49,711 of the problems. 83 00:04:49,923 --> 00:04:53,034 Therefore, of course, the kind of structural racism, 84 00:04:53,034 --> 00:04:55,125 structural sexism that operates, 85 00:04:55,125 --> 00:05:00,718 and of course, the role of private kind of corporations that are clearly playing 86 00:05:00,718 --> 00:05:03,389 an important role in democratic regression. 87 00:05:03,389 --> 00:05:07,671 Are citizen assemblies able to kind of address any of those things? 88 00:05:07,671 --> 00:05:09,702 I am really not convinced. And actually, 89 00:05:09,702 --> 00:05:11,873 the argument that I have been making is that actually, 90 00:05:11,873 --> 00:05:14,794 citizen assemblies have the potential to make it worse. 91 00:05:14,982 --> 00:05:16,533 especially on the first point, 92 00:05:16,533 --> 00:05:20,645 because a lot of citizen assemblies are based on this sort of disintermediation. 93 00:05:20,645 --> 00:05:25,187 So basically, it's an attempt where institutions often relied 94 00:05:25,187 --> 00:05:27,918 on intermediary bodies to connect with citizens, 95 00:05:27,918 --> 00:05:31,710 right? So, you know, there was not a direct relation between citizens 96 00:05:31,810 --> 00:05:35,732 and public institutions, but there were many intermediary bodies, 97 00:05:35,732 --> 00:05:37,994 trade unions, mass political parties, 98 00:05:37,994 --> 00:05:39,535 civil society organizations. 99 00:05:39,867 --> 00:05:41,688 that play this intermediary role, 100 00:05:41,688 --> 00:05:45,831 right? And with the citizen assemblies, 101 00:05:45,831 --> 00:05:49,754 there's an attempt to kind of construct a more direct relation between public 102 00:05:49,754 --> 00:05:54,888 authorities and citizens and basically sidelining all these mediators and say, 103 00:05:54,888 --> 00:05:56,969 you know, we don't need them. They don't represent, 104 00:05:56,969 --> 00:05:58,921 trade unions don't represent people. 105 00:05:58,921 --> 00:06:00,922 ~ Civil society does not represent people. 106 00:06:00,922 --> 00:06:04,815 Let's just construct a direct relation and let's use sortition as a way 107 00:06:05,243 --> 00:06:09,797 to ~ basically get what they call ~ descriptive representation, 108 00:06:09,797 --> 00:06:14,841 which I think is deeply problematic among other things for this reason. 109 00:06:14,841 --> 00:06:20,686 And in doing so, it actually weakens the legitimacy of these intermediary actors 110 00:06:20,686 --> 00:06:22,988 that are not only not invited, 111 00:06:22,988 --> 00:06:26,651 they're just not even considered to be part ~ of the discussion. 112 00:06:26,651 --> 00:06:29,063 in some ways, think citizen assemblies may be 113 00:06:29,393 --> 00:06:32,181 more part of the problem than of the solution. 114 00:06:32,181 --> 00:06:36,954 So that's a little bit the kind of starting point from which I kind of see them. 115 00:06:38,898 --> 00:06:45,063 And you see some other participatory practice that can be used. 116 00:06:45,063 --> 00:06:48,905 Like I'm thinking technology can be used in politics. 117 00:06:48,905 --> 00:06:55,519 And also like it's also what we mean with citizen assembly thinking. 118 00:06:55,519 --> 00:06:59,826 Because ~ if it is a citizen assembly organized by the AU... 119 00:07:00,170 --> 00:07:04,932 and there are, I don't know, just 100 people randomly extracted, 120 00:07:04,932 --> 00:07:09,054 then of course it's not very significant. 121 00:07:09,054 --> 00:07:15,807 I'm thinking which kind 122 00:07:09,761 --> 00:07:10,761 Okay. 123 00:07:15,807 --> 00:07:19,669 of practice can be used in relation to technology and politics 124 00:07:19,669 --> 00:07:21,550 to understand what citizens want. 125 00:07:22,916 --> 00:07:24,737 So there are two things in your question. 126 00:07:24,737 --> 00:07:26,998 The first one is what about the practices? 127 00:07:26,998 --> 00:07:29,500 But of course, when I think about democracy, 128 00:07:29,500 --> 00:07:32,712 democracy is not just kind of a set of best practices, 129 00:07:32,712 --> 00:07:37,625 right? It's also the possibility to contest the foundations of society. 130 00:07:37,625 --> 00:07:42,138 And ~ to me, then it is not just about sort of what are the best. 131 00:07:42,352 --> 00:07:46,674 practices, but what's the end game? 132 00:07:46,674 --> 00:07:48,995 What kind of society do we want? 133 00:07:48,995 --> 00:07:51,646 And these type of debates, of course, 134 00:07:51,646 --> 00:07:55,317 there are some forums that are better suited to have these debates. 135 00:07:55,317 --> 00:07:58,268 But I think it is important to have these debates and not to have them 136 00:07:58,268 --> 00:08:02,210 as individuals, like me as Albert or you as Alessandro, 137 00:08:02,210 --> 00:08:04,340 but to have them through collective actors. 138 00:08:04,534 --> 00:08:06,485 we as workers in a trade union, 139 00:08:06,485 --> 00:08:09,765 we as people that share particular ideology and so on. 140 00:08:09,765 --> 00:08:14,427 So that's the starting point to me is the importance of collective actors 141 00:08:14,848 --> 00:08:18,889 in challenging what we think our society, 142 00:08:18,889 --> 00:08:21,471 how our society should be organized. 143 00:08:21,471 --> 00:08:24,773 Because often the best practices is a way of kind of narrowing a 144 00:08:24,773 --> 00:08:26,283 lot of the discussion. It's like, 145 00:08:26,283 --> 00:08:27,764 OK, let's have a 146 00:08:28,170 --> 00:08:30,111 you know, citizen assembly about, 147 00:08:30,111 --> 00:08:33,582 ~ like for example, the European Union organized the commission on food waste. 148 00:08:33,582 --> 00:08:36,484 Let's, you know, have some very concrete recommendations about food waste. 149 00:08:36,484 --> 00:08:39,054 Yeah, but if you do that, you're taking away, 150 00:08:39,054 --> 00:08:42,486 you're depoliticizing the process by taking away the possibility 151 00:08:42,486 --> 00:08:45,097 of asking some fundamental kind of questions. 152 00:08:45,097 --> 00:08:47,759 And basically you end up with, 153 00:08:47,759 --> 00:08:50,080 okay, you know, how best to, you know, 154 00:08:50,080 --> 00:08:52,340 recycle as individuals and how best not to, 155 00:08:52,340 --> 00:08:55,822 you know, you know, this literally a suggestion from by someone. 156 00:08:56,332 --> 00:09:00,993 that was part of the expert group of the European Commission on the Citizen Panel 157 00:09:00,993 --> 00:09:06,365 on Foodways that basically recommended to go to the shopping store with shopping 158 00:09:06,365 --> 00:09:10,226 lists because if you have a shopping list then you don't buy more than you need. 159 00:09:10,226 --> 00:09:12,387 Therefore, it's this very individual perspective. 160 00:09:12,387 --> 00:09:14,287 So the first part is about, okay, 161 00:09:14,287 --> 00:09:16,008 we need more collective actors. 162 00:09:16,008 --> 00:09:21,949 I can already tell you I don't have a very concrete institutional proposal about 163 00:09:21,949 --> 00:09:24,950 how best to kind of organize ~ participation. 164 00:09:25,850 --> 00:09:29,171 And then the second dimension of your question was about technology. 165 00:09:29,171 --> 00:09:33,053 And I find this really interesting and this way we have also, 166 00:09:33,053 --> 00:09:35,434 I have also worked with some colleagues on this. 167 00:09:35,434 --> 00:09:41,057 So notably with Perel Petit, we wrote a paper on the citizen washing 168 00:09:41,057 --> 00:09:46,329 of EU tech policies by the EU in which we looked at the panels that 169 00:09:46,329 --> 00:09:48,460 the EU organized in regards to technology. 170 00:09:48,460 --> 00:09:52,592 So basically technology as an object of deliberation. 171 00:09:53,284 --> 00:09:57,136 And then I worked on another paper with Nicolas Palomo 172 00:09:57,557 --> 00:10:03,230 on basically how technology is increasingly seen as ~ a 173 00:10:03,230 --> 00:10:09,173 way to improve deliberation. So technology as an instrument that might help 174 00:10:09,173 --> 00:10:13,365 to get deliberation, right? And in this context, 175 00:10:13,365 --> 00:10:18,761 I find problematic to see first technology as necessarily a positive kind 176 00:10:18,761 --> 00:10:20,800 of solution to something. It's like, 177 00:10:20,800 --> 00:10:21,800 well, OK. 178 00:10:21,778 --> 00:10:25,761 ~ We first have to diagnose what the problem is in order to then find 179 00:10:25,761 --> 00:10:30,343 a solution When technology is used as as a means to improve the liberation? 180 00:10:30,343 --> 00:10:35,967 We don't or you know the the the organizations that are mobilizing kind 181 00:10:35,967 --> 00:10:39,649 of This logic I think have a very technocratic understanding of deliberation, 182 00:10:39,649 --> 00:10:40,970 you know because they say okay, 183 00:10:40,970 --> 00:10:44,963 you know you know AI can help us to you know, 184 00:10:44,963 --> 00:10:47,074 take notes and you know make a 185 00:10:47,518 --> 00:10:50,410 you know, moderation easier and things like that. 186 00:10:50,410 --> 00:10:54,122 you know, the problem is not just the technocratic one of, 187 00:10:54,122 --> 00:10:59,595 know, solving some kind of things that ~ organizers deal with, 188 00:10:59,595 --> 00:11:01,526 but there's a more fundamental problem. 189 00:11:01,526 --> 00:11:04,868 And then there's a deeper question about technology, 190 00:11:04,868 --> 00:11:06,999 which is, okay, who is controlling technology? 191 00:11:06,999 --> 00:11:10,451 Because technology is not just a neutral kind of ~ tool, 192 00:11:10,451 --> 00:11:14,373 but has a philosophy embedded in it. 193 00:11:14,705 --> 00:11:18,867 And here is where I think the role of big tech companies is very relevant because 194 00:11:18,867 --> 00:11:22,589 they are increasingly being precisely part of the problem, 195 00:11:22,589 --> 00:11:26,171 right? And we see the role of tech oligarchs that are having 196 00:11:26,171 --> 00:11:29,083 an increasingly important role in democratic regression, 197 00:11:29,083 --> 00:11:31,514 supporting far-right parties everywhere, 198 00:11:31,514 --> 00:11:34,455 and shaping a lot of the conversations. 199 00:11:34,455 --> 00:11:38,127 So that's why I like to see as well technology both as an object 200 00:11:38,127 --> 00:11:39,238 of deliberation but also 201 00:11:39,534 --> 00:11:41,875 as a means to improve the liberation. 202 00:11:41,875 --> 00:11:45,917 And when looking at that, we really need to look at the underlying kind 203 00:11:45,917 --> 00:11:49,901 of political economy of technology and the political economy of society more broadly 204 00:11:49,921 --> 00:11:50,921 and question it. 205 00:11:52,709 --> 00:11:58,493 I think the problem can be the fact that the citizen assembly is 206 00:11:58,493 --> 00:12:00,375 not organized by the citizens. 207 00:12:00,375 --> 00:12:03,027 Because I'm thinking if, I don't know, 208 00:12:03,027 --> 00:12:08,000 like in a town, citizens could organize a citizen assembly by themselves, 209 00:12:08,000 --> 00:12:10,402 choosing the topic and so on, or like also, 210 00:12:10,402 --> 00:12:17,207 I don't know, in different cities to propose something to change the law, 211 00:12:17,207 --> 00:12:18,207 then... 212 00:12:17,965 --> 00:12:19,144 maybe could be different. 213 00:12:19,844 --> 00:12:24,576 I mean, I am not convinced either about the possibility of citizens organizing their 214 00:12:24,576 --> 00:12:28,347 own, but I do think that as you're already hinting at, 215 00:12:28,347 --> 00:12:33,199 there is an important question in analyzing who is organizing citizen assemblies 216 00:12:33,199 --> 00:12:37,931 because we are also seeing a massive increase of the industry of participation. 217 00:12:37,931 --> 00:12:42,233 So there is increasingly basically private companies that are whose 218 00:12:42,233 --> 00:12:44,194 job is to organize citizen assemblies. 219 00:12:44,194 --> 00:12:45,234 you know, even if 220 00:12:45,854 --> 00:12:51,316 many of them have this kind of rhetoric and discourse about improving democracy 221 00:12:51,316 --> 00:12:58,287 and so on. Ultimately, they are also private consultancies and companies that their 222 00:12:58,287 --> 00:13:01,207 products, the products they sell are citizen assemblies. 223 00:13:01,207 --> 00:13:06,280 This is what's happening. And we cannot disentangle this from also 224 00:13:06,280 --> 00:13:08,110 the relation they have to, for example, 225 00:13:08,110 --> 00:13:10,491 in the case of technology, with some private companies. 226 00:13:10,909 --> 00:13:14,671 and private tech companies more concretely because it's not by chance that there's 227 00:13:14,671 --> 00:13:17,553 a lot of tech companies that are increasingly interested 228 00:13:17,594 --> 00:13:22,787 in citizen participation precisely because they see their objects of they 229 00:13:22,787 --> 00:13:25,828 are blamed for lack of democracy and so on. 230 00:13:25,828 --> 00:13:29,500 Obviously that's obviously accurate. 231 00:13:29,500 --> 00:13:34,394 But we see for example in the US the Stanford Deliberative Democracy Lab. 232 00:13:34,898 --> 00:13:37,809 that is, I think, was headed by James Fishkin, 233 00:13:37,809 --> 00:13:40,851 a well-known academic in the field of deliberative democracy, 234 00:13:40,851 --> 00:13:45,273 is increasingly making ~ projects with Meta. 235 00:13:45,273 --> 00:13:48,716 I remember one on AI agents that I think was last year. 236 00:13:48,716 --> 00:13:53,800 Or there are also some other colleagues that have cooperated with ~ OpenAI. 237 00:13:53,800 --> 00:13:56,442 I am thinking here of Helen Landemore that I think... 238 00:13:56,442 --> 00:13:57,442 ~ 239 00:13:57,122 --> 00:14:01,144 ~ was part of the grants program of OpenAI, 240 00:14:01,144 --> 00:14:04,145 I think in 2023 or so on. 241 00:14:04,145 --> 00:14:08,457 So, you know, there's a very close entanglement between some of 242 00:14:08,457 --> 00:14:12,448 the organizers of some of these citizen assemblies with some of 243 00:14:12,448 --> 00:14:16,679 the companies that are providing some of the infrastructure, 244 00:14:16,679 --> 00:14:18,290 the tech infrastructure, right? 245 00:14:18,290 --> 00:14:19,981 So it's not by chance, for instance, 246 00:14:19,981 --> 00:14:21,521 in the paper we wrote with Nicolas, 247 00:14:21,521 --> 00:14:23,002 we also looked at the Habermas machine. 248 00:14:23,388 --> 00:14:26,190 that was created by Google DeepMind. 249 00:14:26,190 --> 00:14:30,033 And of course, they think that AI can be super helpful to find 250 00:14:30,334 --> 00:14:34,396 and create consensus ~ across different groups. 251 00:14:34,396 --> 00:14:37,759 So I think it is important to look precisely at, 252 00:14:37,759 --> 00:14:41,341 OK, these processes are not just neutral processes. 253 00:14:41,341 --> 00:14:45,325 They are led by some very specific groups and interests. 254 00:14:45,325 --> 00:14:50,148 And ~ while I'm not discarding the idea that deliberation is important, 255 00:14:50,148 --> 00:14:51,148 like, OK. 256 00:14:51,246 --> 00:14:55,726 who is organizing this deliberation and who is deciding how this is organized. 257 00:14:55,726 --> 00:14:58,418 So, yeah. 258 00:15:01,568 --> 00:15:07,691 A lot of things and Big Techs are in some way an issue. 259 00:15:07,691 --> 00:15:13,863 I'm also thinking that maybe it could be something that can 260 00:15:13,863 --> 00:15:20,657 be done step by step. now we are experimenting and using technologies from 261 00:15:20,657 --> 00:15:27,309 Big Techs. Maybe in the future some open source models can be used. 262 00:15:27,581 --> 00:15:31,391 But also, I'm thinking regarding what we were saying before, 263 00:15:31,391 --> 00:15:34,612 like if we really need technology in politics, 264 00:15:34,612 --> 00:15:37,943 because actually I also think that we do not need it. 265 00:15:37,943 --> 00:15:40,684 mean, also without technology, 266 00:15:40,684 --> 00:15:44,045 there are a lot of improvement that we could do in politics. 267 00:15:44,045 --> 00:15:48,046 Then what I'm thinking is that technology maybe could allow, 268 00:15:48,046 --> 00:15:52,208 let's say, direct democracy without technology would not be possible. 269 00:15:52,208 --> 00:15:53,598 Or maybe yes, I don't know. 270 00:15:54,544 --> 00:15:55,544 What do you think? 271 00:15:56,000 --> 00:15:58,641 Yeah, so I'm not against technology. 272 00:15:58,641 --> 00:16:02,433 I think that it needs to, we need to be clear about what sort 273 00:16:02,433 --> 00:16:05,885 of technology we're using and what the purpose of that technology is. 274 00:16:05,885 --> 00:16:09,297 And I think there is a risk in further normalizing. 275 00:16:09,297 --> 00:16:11,848 So I think already, unfortunately, 276 00:16:11,848 --> 00:16:17,031 you know, all these different AI applications have been largely normalized across 277 00:16:17,031 --> 00:16:18,492 society in multiple ways. 278 00:16:18,988 --> 00:16:21,990 And I find that deeply troubling for many reasons, 279 00:16:21,990 --> 00:16:26,123 like the labor exploitation that is required for AI to be possible, 280 00:16:26,123 --> 00:16:27,916 mostly with labor in the global south, 281 00:16:27,916 --> 00:16:30,709 the environmental costs of this, 282 00:16:30,709 --> 00:16:34,022 the increasing amounts of data centers being built everywhere. 283 00:16:34,022 --> 00:16:36,785 So I think that is very troubling that we, 284 00:16:36,785 --> 00:16:38,346 even in the field of democracy, 285 00:16:38,346 --> 00:16:40,188 I I remember there was the like. 286 00:16:40,364 --> 00:16:42,395 for example, a citizen assembly, 287 00:16:42,395 --> 00:16:45,226 I think was in Finland on energy, 288 00:16:45,226 --> 00:16:50,348 where they were using AI. Let's do a citizen assembly on energy efficiency. 289 00:16:50,348 --> 00:16:54,770 And at the same time, let's use AI to help deliberation. 290 00:16:54,770 --> 00:16:57,581 I mean, even in that sort of context, 291 00:16:57,581 --> 00:17:00,732 there's, I think, little awareness of the dangers of it. 292 00:17:00,732 --> 00:17:03,103 Now, that said, think technology, 293 00:17:03,103 --> 00:17:05,294 it is important to, you 294 00:17:05,800 --> 00:17:07,662 both communicate and organize. 295 00:17:07,662 --> 00:17:10,983 So I think that there is a point in having technology. 296 00:17:10,983 --> 00:17:14,234 And I would not make an argument that we should just get rid of all technology, 297 00:17:14,234 --> 00:17:19,068 but we should democratize it. And this does not mean democratizing AI 298 00:17:19,068 --> 00:17:21,309 to just make it wrong by the state, 299 00:17:21,309 --> 00:17:27,702 but make technology first publicly controlled or public democratically controlled. 300 00:17:28,352 --> 00:17:31,223 So far, it's just private companies developing whatever they want. 301 00:17:31,223 --> 00:17:34,884 And second, we would have to see what sort of applications we want to use. 302 00:17:34,884 --> 00:17:38,906 mean, with the ChatGPT or things like that, 303 00:17:38,906 --> 00:17:44,529 there's no democratic legitimacy to simply ~ throwing all these tools to society. 304 00:17:44,529 --> 00:17:51,122 And I mean, no one has been asked whether ChatGPT was a good idea to begin with, 305 00:17:51,122 --> 00:17:52,523 right? They just launched it there. 306 00:17:52,769 --> 00:17:54,910 and then suddenly millions of people started using it. 307 00:17:54,910 --> 00:17:57,420 And now it's very difficult to roll back, 308 00:17:57,420 --> 00:17:59,211 right? Because once you roll something in, 309 00:17:59,211 --> 00:18:00,531 it's very difficult to roll back. 310 00:18:00,531 --> 00:18:04,932 But rolling it in in the first place is also a political decision, 311 00:18:04,932 --> 00:18:08,773 right? ~ A political decision that has been taken by a private company. 312 00:18:08,773 --> 00:18:13,804 So I think we would have to see what sort of technologies and means we need 313 00:18:13,804 --> 00:18:18,016 in a democratic society. And that's why I advocate for kind of strong 314 00:18:18,393 --> 00:18:21,779 collective actors that are able precisely to take into account 315 00:18:21,779 --> 00:18:25,846 the various risks that exist when normalizing or integrating 316 00:18:25,846 --> 00:18:27,029 new types of technology. 317 00:18:29,545 --> 00:18:30,936 Also controlling the technology, 318 00:18:30,936 --> 00:18:32,396 I think, is something very hard. 319 00:18:32,396 --> 00:18:38,811 Unfortunately also because there is no way to know what is running on the server. 320 00:18:38,811 --> 00:18:41,112 Like I'm thinking also about open source software. 321 00:18:41,112 --> 00:18:43,713 You can check maybe the GitHub repo, 322 00:18:43,713 --> 00:18:47,325 you can check the code, but then you don't know if the code on 323 00:18:47,325 --> 00:18:50,336 the server is modified or not. 324 00:18:50,336 --> 00:18:53,397 And so I'm a little bit skeptical sometimes about 325 00:18:54,789 --> 00:18:56,680 The regulation that cannot be made. 326 00:18:56,680 --> 00:19:02,122 not against regulation. It's something just in relation to technology that sometimes 327 00:19:02,122 --> 00:19:04,483 is not because sometimes you you say, 328 00:19:04,483 --> 00:19:06,885 okay, we regulated and we're happy. 329 00:19:06,885 --> 00:19:10,917 then it doesn't mean that something is happening in the black box. 330 00:19:10,955 --> 00:19:13,847 guess the question here is not so much about regulation, 331 00:19:13,847 --> 00:19:15,538 although there is a dimension of it, 332 00:19:15,538 --> 00:19:20,411 but about, for example, the introduction of some of this new technology. 333 00:19:20,411 --> 00:19:24,613 say that now we have AI tools, 334 00:19:24,613 --> 00:19:26,795 like chatbots and things like that, 335 00:19:26,795 --> 00:19:29,267 that basically are able to do almost anything. 336 00:19:29,267 --> 00:19:30,498 So it's like general purpose. 337 00:19:31,154 --> 00:19:36,155 this I think creates a very important problem because they are general purpose. 338 00:19:36,155 --> 00:19:41,137 These companies say, well, in order to develop this general purpose technology, 339 00:19:41,137 --> 00:19:43,398 we need as much data as we can. 340 00:19:43,398 --> 00:19:45,668 Because without as much data, which by the way, 341 00:19:45,668 --> 00:19:49,820 there are a lot of problems with the ways in which they took the data 342 00:19:49,820 --> 00:19:51,800 to train their AI models to begin with. 343 00:19:51,800 --> 00:19:53,580 But that's a different question. 344 00:19:53,580 --> 00:19:55,161 But OK, now. 345 00:19:55,771 --> 00:19:58,393 If you were to say, no, but at the same time, 346 00:19:58,393 --> 00:20:02,815 AI is very important because that's how we are able to cure cancer 347 00:20:02,815 --> 00:20:06,007 or identify cancer and so on. It's like, 348 00:20:06,007 --> 00:20:09,429 maybe we could think of ways to, 349 00:20:09,429 --> 00:20:15,112 OK, we want a technology that is targeted and specific to cure cancer 350 00:20:15,112 --> 00:20:17,083 or to identify cancer. Well, OK, 351 00:20:17,083 --> 00:20:18,083 maybe that's great. 352 00:20:18,230 --> 00:20:22,111 And then we only need data that is specific to that purpose. 353 00:20:22,111 --> 00:20:25,012 And this is the exact opposite to what is happening now. 354 00:20:25,012 --> 00:20:26,942 That we have AI models that are, 355 00:20:26,942 --> 00:20:28,582 for example, all encompassing. 356 00:20:28,582 --> 00:20:32,453 They just take all the data that there is in order to be able to try to 357 00:20:32,453 --> 00:20:37,794 do sort of almost everything. And I think this creates a very big tension that, 358 00:20:37,794 --> 00:20:42,386 yeah, I think instead of having the new level that you have the AI Act, 359 00:20:42,386 --> 00:20:43,556 which is like a risk-based 360 00:20:43,866 --> 00:20:48,059 approach, but maybe it would be kind of like the opposite logic of saying, 361 00:20:48,059 --> 00:20:49,981 okay, you you want an AI application, 362 00:20:49,981 --> 00:20:53,504 show me what the purpose is, and then maybe, 363 00:20:53,504 --> 00:20:56,646 you know, we can develop and maybe it should be publicly developed. 364 00:20:56,646 --> 00:20:58,277 And in the case of deliberation, 365 00:20:58,277 --> 00:21:02,341 that is the case, you know, there are some actors are just taking 366 00:21:02,341 --> 00:21:05,093 AI because it saves them a little bit of time. 367 00:21:05,093 --> 00:21:07,654 And I think are making deliberation even worse. 368 00:21:08,014 --> 00:21:10,055 to be honest, in addition of this logic of, 369 00:21:10,055 --> 00:21:12,136 you know, they are trying to, okay, 370 00:21:12,136 --> 00:21:15,458 can we really use the master's tools to dismantle the master house 371 00:21:15,458 --> 00:21:20,011 to like quote Audre Lorde, like can we use the very same technology that 372 00:21:20,011 --> 00:21:23,743 is developed by those actors that are responsible for democratic regression 373 00:21:24,003 --> 00:21:26,324 in order to counter democratic regression? 374 00:21:26,324 --> 00:21:29,876 I'm not sure you can be both the problem and the solution at the same time. 375 00:21:31,618 --> 00:21:35,647 Let's say open questions. mean a lot of issues and... 376 00:21:38,119 --> 00:21:41,662 I think so. You that. 377 00:21:41,662 --> 00:21:46,246 I is also a political tool, something like that. 378 00:21:46,246 --> 00:21:50,699 And so it should be. And I basically a private company decided to release 379 00:21:50,699 --> 00:21:57,344 a tool to the people. mean customers and also people that are giving away 380 00:21:57,344 --> 00:21:58,835 the data because then there are. 381 00:21:59,201 --> 00:22:04,663 retraining the models. And so if 382 00:22:04,663 --> 00:22:09,632 the state has to actually authorize or deny 383 00:22:09,632 --> 00:22:14,195 if a new model is released, 384 00:22:14,195 --> 00:22:16,896 because right now it's not working in this way. 385 00:22:16,896 --> 00:22:18,917 So this is what you're suggesting. 386 00:22:18,917 --> 00:22:22,677 So that there is a, let's say a more collective decision. 387 00:22:22,889 --> 00:22:25,101 Or is it the state that decides, 388 00:22:25,101 --> 00:22:29,376 okay, this technology is good for society or not good for society, 389 00:22:29,376 --> 00:22:30,376 right? 390 00:22:30,241 --> 00:22:31,861 Yes, well, at there should be some, 391 00:22:31,861 --> 00:22:34,601 you know, collective discussions about these things. 392 00:22:34,601 --> 00:22:38,661 And of course, there are also problematic uses of AI by the state, 393 00:22:38,661 --> 00:22:41,181 you know, and, you know, it's clear that, 394 00:22:41,181 --> 00:22:45,881 you know, the states are not innocent in a lot of these things. 395 00:22:45,881 --> 00:22:50,941 I mean, we see how, you know, increasingly states are making deals with companies 396 00:22:50,941 --> 00:22:56,101 like Palantir or, you know, also with OpenAI or, 397 00:22:56,101 --> 00:22:59,541 or Anthropic and so on. So 398 00:23:00,373 --> 00:23:04,355 Yes, states are not innocent and they are not just the only, 399 00:23:04,355 --> 00:23:05,665 they are not just the solution, 400 00:23:05,665 --> 00:23:10,337 right? But precisely, I think that we need some democratic legitimacy 401 00:23:10,337 --> 00:23:14,369 and collective decision making to decide about these technologies 402 00:23:14,369 --> 00:23:19,161 in the first place. I don't have a very concrete kind of recommendation about 403 00:23:19,161 --> 00:23:21,462 the process of how that should work. 404 00:23:21,462 --> 00:23:25,903 And I would not want to get entangled in very technocratic kind of logics. 405 00:23:25,903 --> 00:23:27,383 But I think that's definitely the case. 406 00:23:27,383 --> 00:23:28,383 And a lot of 407 00:23:28,343 --> 00:23:31,745 actors within the deliberative democracy community on the grounds of, 408 00:23:31,745 --> 00:23:34,226 you we need to scale democratic innovations, 409 00:23:34,226 --> 00:23:37,747 you know, on those grounds, they are very, 410 00:23:37,747 --> 00:23:43,078 yeah, problematically just normalizing these types of technologies without, 411 00:23:43,078 --> 00:23:47,270 I think, necessary reflection about the embedded philosophy 412 00:23:47,270 --> 00:23:48,621 in this these technologies. 413 00:23:51,013 --> 00:23:56,636 Okay, because I agree about the collective discussion 414 00:23:56,636 --> 00:24:00,708 so that we understand if something is positive or negative for society. 415 00:24:00,708 --> 00:24:04,730 But then I wonder how to make it happen, 416 00:24:04,730 --> 00:24:06,151 let's say, without technology. 417 00:24:06,151 --> 00:24:12,534 Because I see maybe in this I have some faith 418 00:24:12,935 --> 00:24:15,096 that maybe technology could be helpful. 419 00:24:15,404 --> 00:24:19,764 to actually do what you are suggesting because it 420 00:24:19,764 --> 00:24:23,504 is easier sometimes to, 421 00:24:23,504 --> 00:24:27,724 I don't know if we are thousands and thousands of people to vote on 422 00:24:27,724 --> 00:24:32,004 an issue and decide if we want something or we do not want something else. 423 00:24:34,368 --> 00:24:37,559 No, yeah, I agree. I mean, 424 00:24:37,559 --> 00:24:42,511 there's some excellent work by colleagues like Rafael Groman, 425 00:24:42,511 --> 00:24:45,232 who has worked, for example, on cooperatives, 426 00:24:45,232 --> 00:24:49,773 like organizations that use technology and that develop technology as cooperatives. 427 00:24:49,773 --> 00:24:52,034 So I do think that technology is some potential, 428 00:24:52,034 --> 00:24:55,375 and I don't want to situate myself as necessarily anti-technology. 429 00:24:55,793 --> 00:24:59,515 But I am certainly anti certain types of technology that 430 00:24:59,515 --> 00:25:03,847 are entrenching certain political social relations that 431 00:25:03,847 --> 00:25:08,900 I find deeply problematic. I think it's I mean, 432 00:25:08,900 --> 00:25:13,312 technology can be a source to organizing and so on. 433 00:25:13,312 --> 00:25:17,134 But we can also, you know, I think that look at social media. 434 00:25:17,134 --> 00:25:19,141 mean, social media started 2010, 435 00:25:19,141 --> 00:25:22,477 2011 Occupy, Arab Spring, Indignados Movement. 436 00:25:23,013 --> 00:25:27,186 And Twitter was a very common space for these kind of logics, 437 00:25:27,186 --> 00:25:32,741 right? And develop narratives that countered ~ governments and so on. 438 00:25:32,741 --> 00:25:35,043 But what I think, or Facebook, 439 00:25:35,043 --> 00:25:37,745 very few people or some people, 440 00:25:37,745 --> 00:25:42,128 but not a lot, maybe did not analyze as well the political economy that 441 00:25:42,128 --> 00:25:46,492 was operating at the time. while these spaces were being used 442 00:25:46,492 --> 00:25:48,244 for organizing and activism. 443 00:25:49,090 --> 00:25:53,632 These companies were extracting all the data that was later used 444 00:25:53,652 --> 00:25:58,704 to basically first to Target ads because that's how they make money and that's 445 00:25:58,704 --> 00:26:01,686 how I Expect AI to make money. 446 00:26:01,686 --> 00:26:04,087 They would just input ads into chat GPT, 447 00:26:04,087 --> 00:26:07,898 know So you will be doing something and they will just because they know everything 448 00:26:07,898 --> 00:26:12,560 you like So if you understand like football you will get football ads And so 449 00:26:13,230 --> 00:26:16,591 technology is necessary and these spaces are necessary. 450 00:26:16,591 --> 00:26:21,763 I think a space like what used to be Twitter is helpful. 451 00:26:21,763 --> 00:26:25,135 The question is, okay, who is in control of these? 452 00:26:25,135 --> 00:26:27,905 What is the structure of these processes? 453 00:26:27,905 --> 00:26:30,987 And I have little hope that these spaces, 454 00:26:30,987 --> 00:26:35,909 if controlled by a political economy that is dominated by a few corporations, 455 00:26:35,909 --> 00:26:38,870 can ultimately, I mean, they can just switch it off. 456 00:26:38,870 --> 00:26:41,351 They can ~ shadow ban people. 457 00:26:42,183 --> 00:26:44,242 So we need to think as well of alternatives. 458 00:26:46,323 --> 00:26:52,408 Yeah, mean, absolutely. think that Big Tech represent a problem. 459 00:26:52,408 --> 00:26:57,563 Also, like in Italy, a couple of days ago in a municipality, 460 00:26:57,563 --> 00:27:03,268 there was a miller that basically put an 461 00:27:03,268 --> 00:27:07,982 AI agent as part of the municipality. 462 00:27:09,010 --> 00:27:10,320 I'm interested in the experiment. 463 00:27:10,320 --> 00:27:14,692 the same time, I wonder if they use some technology, 464 00:27:14,692 --> 00:27:18,513 let's say open source technology hosted inside the municipality, 465 00:27:18,513 --> 00:27:21,213 or if they are using, I don't know, 466 00:27:21,213 --> 00:27:23,984 charge GPT or Claude, because that means, 467 00:27:23,984 --> 00:27:29,404 okay, one, let's say politician in Italy that is using open AI is not a problem. 468 00:27:29,404 --> 00:27:33,335 But then let's say that there is one or more in every Italian municipality 469 00:27:33,556 --> 00:27:34,956 and then maybe inside the parliament. 470 00:27:35,076 --> 00:27:37,655 then as you can see they can switch it off and 471 00:27:39,436 --> 00:27:44,069 Yeah, I think they are these tech companies are increasingly making 472 00:27:44,069 --> 00:27:45,960 us dependent on them. I mean, now, 473 00:27:45,960 --> 00:27:47,692 if you look at, for example, universities, 474 00:27:47,692 --> 00:27:49,963 they most of them have agreements with Microsoft, 475 00:27:49,963 --> 00:27:52,795 right? And it's not just for AI is like for outlook, 476 00:27:52,795 --> 00:27:55,247 like emails and words and stuff like that, 477 00:27:55,247 --> 00:27:58,329 right? And now they just integrated copilot within it. 478 00:27:58,329 --> 00:28:03,092 And what is happening is that increasingly more sectors 479 00:28:03,092 --> 00:28:05,374 of society are integrating 480 00:28:05,574 --> 00:28:07,855 these technologies in their day to day. 481 00:28:07,855 --> 00:28:10,276 Initially, I would imagine for not a lot of money, 482 00:28:10,276 --> 00:28:13,727 but the moment that they become very dependent, 483 00:28:13,727 --> 00:28:18,078 then suddenly they can just raise the prices ~ as much as they want because 484 00:28:18,078 --> 00:28:23,400 it would be very difficult to move away from them because you just become dependent, 485 00:28:23,400 --> 00:28:26,211 you just integrated in your daily work. 486 00:28:26,211 --> 00:28:27,382 If I would start... 487 00:28:28,306 --> 00:28:31,778 now writing with Chagy Pt. What would happen is that in two years time, 488 00:28:31,778 --> 00:28:34,557 I would just not know how to write or it would be very difficult, 489 00:28:34,557 --> 00:28:38,552 you know, and like this is happening a little bit in a lot of sectors. 490 00:28:38,552 --> 00:28:44,075 So this gains them, gains these companies a lot of leverage towards public 491 00:28:44,075 --> 00:28:47,316 authorities, towards other companies and towards citizens in general. 492 00:28:47,316 --> 00:28:52,599 So that's why I think, yeah, keeping an eye and especially when 493 00:28:52,599 --> 00:28:54,540 we think of democracy and how to improve 494 00:28:55,133 --> 00:28:59,982 deliberation and so on. We also keep in mind as well the infrastructure upon which 495 00:29:00,142 --> 00:29:02,046 deliberation devices are built. 496 00:29:04,116 --> 00:29:07,237 Absolutely. I am in also relation to this. 497 00:29:07,237 --> 00:29:11,168 I mean that university are using Google and Microsoft. 498 00:29:11,168 --> 00:29:16,470 I remember then I was at the University of of Milan. 499 00:29:16,470 --> 00:29:22,752 And I think it was during COVID times that or just after that they switched from 500 00:29:23,213 --> 00:29:27,814 let's say self hosted email from so they were hosted inside the university 501 00:29:27,814 --> 00:29:28,995 or like something like that. 502 00:29:29,747 --> 00:29:33,907 to and it has to Microsoft and actually interviewed 503 00:29:33,907 --> 00:29:37,967 the leader of the technical department 504 00:29:37,967 --> 00:29:44,807 and he explained me very well how before the war like I don't know five 505 00:29:44,807 --> 00:29:50,007 people that were managing the email accounts and so it was way cheaper 506 00:29:50,007 --> 00:29:55,767 to give it Microsoft but then of course you're also giving the data and 507 00:29:55,767 --> 00:29:58,707 in the long term I think is not cheaper. 508 00:29:59,923 --> 00:30:00,923 I'm 509 00:30:03,984 --> 00:30:09,619 No, sorry. And then another thing is that if the infrastructure 510 00:30:09,619 --> 00:30:12,943 of the university run, let's say on Microsoft Teams, 511 00:30:12,943 --> 00:30:19,689 then I wonder what is then the university because then Microsoft will just add, 512 00:30:19,689 --> 00:30:24,133 I don't know, some classes there and then Microsoft became the university. 513 00:30:25,819 --> 00:30:29,522 there's increasingly involvement of ~ Google and Microsoft 514 00:30:29,522 --> 00:30:34,596 in educational processes like in schools and universities and so on. 515 00:30:34,596 --> 00:30:40,611 yeah, and indeed what you're saying is really accurate in the sense that there 516 00:30:40,611 --> 00:30:42,713 is a cost to it that is not just economic, 517 00:30:42,713 --> 00:30:44,264 but it's also a democratic one. 518 00:30:44,264 --> 00:30:48,738 And the more spaces that rely on these companies, 519 00:30:48,738 --> 00:30:53,191 well, the more leverage these companies will have and the more power they will gain 520 00:30:53,191 --> 00:30:54,191 in society. 521 00:30:54,658 --> 00:31:00,512 So yeah, and that's why I'm quite critical of the idea that technology 522 00:31:00,512 --> 00:31:03,144 can be a solution for lot of democratic deliberation. 523 00:31:03,144 --> 00:31:06,326 Because it's a very technosolutionist kind of logic, 524 00:31:06,326 --> 00:31:08,498 where you think that technology is the solution, 525 00:31:08,498 --> 00:31:13,381 but then you identify the problem in sort of very small kind of ways. 526 00:31:13,381 --> 00:31:16,643 It's like looking at the trees instead of looking at the forest. 527 00:31:16,733 --> 00:31:19,507 And then, OK, I have this small thing with the moderator. 528 00:31:19,507 --> 00:31:23,071 Maybe if I use technology, then I can sort it out. 529 00:31:23,071 --> 00:31:29,349 But we lose track of the forest and the more systemic kind of problems that 530 00:31:29,349 --> 00:31:30,349 may arise from it. 531 00:31:31,500 --> 00:31:35,183 I don't know if you have seen like the agentic state initiative. 532 00:31:35,183 --> 00:31:38,866 Okay. I will describe briefly the concept that 533 00:31:38,866 --> 00:31:45,000 is citizens now are used to services that 534 00:31:45,000 --> 00:31:49,753 are very fast and efficient. So let's say I order something on Amazon, 535 00:31:49,753 --> 00:31:52,656 it arrives in some hours. 536 00:31:53,326 --> 00:31:59,516 or I do something on Google and it's free and they provide it in a, 537 00:31:59,516 --> 00:32:04,355 let's say efficient way while the state is slower usually. 538 00:32:04,355 --> 00:32:09,023 I mean, way, way, slower. And so basically the concept is if 539 00:32:09,023 --> 00:32:13,306 the state doesn't become efficient and fast 540 00:32:13,486 --> 00:32:16,869 as private companies are, 541 00:32:16,869 --> 00:32:20,241 people will just use private companies and the state will 542 00:32:20,507 --> 00:32:23,361 not exist anymore. This is more or less what I understood. 543 00:32:24,487 --> 00:32:26,238 Yeah, but it is so scary. mean, 544 00:32:26,238 --> 00:32:31,522 because all this, especially the agentic kind of AI logics, 545 00:32:31,522 --> 00:32:37,607 it's a very dehumanizing process because we are increasingly where, 546 00:32:37,607 --> 00:32:41,089 I mean, with the emergence of the iPhones and smartphones and so on, 547 00:32:41,089 --> 00:32:43,811 we have already, you you go, I don't know, 548 00:32:43,811 --> 00:32:45,953 public transport and most of the people is with their phone, 549 00:32:45,953 --> 00:32:47,824 right? But now this is just... 550 00:32:47,984 --> 00:32:52,655 get a new step in this kind of dehumanization and individualization logic where 551 00:32:52,655 --> 00:32:58,297 you're just having a relation to other people through the technology. 552 00:32:58,297 --> 00:33:00,667 instead of, ~ mean, here, of course, 553 00:33:00,667 --> 00:33:04,698 it's paradoxical that we are doing this through Google Meets. 554 00:33:04,698 --> 00:33:06,219 in some ways, OK, you can say, 555 00:33:06,219 --> 00:33:09,199 OK, at least we are having a direct conversation. 556 00:33:09,867 --> 00:33:12,309 You're not an AI agent, I am not either. 557 00:33:12,309 --> 00:33:17,052 But what is increasingly happening is that ~ this is taking place. 558 00:33:17,052 --> 00:33:19,064 you will stay. I mean, it's already the case, 559 00:33:19,064 --> 00:33:20,975 but it will be multiplied by a lot. 560 00:33:20,975 --> 00:33:23,397 You go to do a shopping in the store, 561 00:33:23,397 --> 00:33:27,099 and you don't even speak to the cashier because either it will 562 00:33:27,099 --> 00:33:32,964 be straight inputted or you have this kind of self-checkout, 563 00:33:32,964 --> 00:33:34,865 where you're not even talking to anyone. 564 00:33:35,103 --> 00:33:36,673 And this is the same logic with the state. 565 00:33:36,673 --> 00:33:41,954 Like, OK, you don't go to talk to people in the union to say, 566 00:33:41,954 --> 00:33:44,765 OK, what about these unemployment documents or so on? 567 00:33:44,765 --> 00:33:48,820 You will just face an agentic AI. 568 00:33:48,820 --> 00:33:51,701 And this is happening across kind of dimensions. 569 00:33:51,701 --> 00:33:56,022 Like, even I saw that there are some romantic AIs, 570 00:33:56,022 --> 00:33:59,603 like AIs that do therapy. So this is increasing. 571 00:34:00,143 --> 00:34:05,583 our individualization and dehumanization by making us dependent 572 00:34:05,583 --> 00:34:10,583 on the technology that is at the same time separating us from other people 573 00:34:10,583 --> 00:34:13,862 and other humans. And if for me technology is helpful, 574 00:34:13,862 --> 00:34:16,183 it's precisely as a way to connect to other people. 575 00:34:16,183 --> 00:34:20,123 Whereas here it's used to do precisely the opposite, 576 00:34:20,123 --> 00:34:23,303 being used to disconnect people from other people. 577 00:34:23,303 --> 00:34:27,763 And increasingly we think of us as uniquely individuals, 578 00:34:27,763 --> 00:34:29,683 not as part of bigger groups of 579 00:34:30,016 --> 00:34:32,116 as workers, parts of a bigger community. 580 00:34:34,540 --> 00:34:37,444 Yeah, I think also like without technology, 581 00:34:37,444 --> 00:34:44,244 we will not be able to talk and probably we would have talked with someone near us. 582 00:34:44,244 --> 00:34:48,389 And so is the disconnecting but also I think connecting on the... 583 00:34:51,252 --> 00:34:52,491 on the longer 584 00:34:53,472 --> 00:34:55,304 Yeah, but here's where you can see, 585 00:34:55,304 --> 00:35:00,228 what sort of technology is contributing to connect people and what sort 586 00:35:00,228 --> 00:35:03,230 of technology is contributing to disconnect people. 587 00:35:03,230 --> 00:35:08,795 And I think, you know, to me, it is very clear that a lot of these AI chatbots are, 588 00:35:08,795 --> 00:35:13,269 mean, to me, they should be banned ~ because they are precisely really used 589 00:35:13,269 --> 00:35:15,080 to disconnect people, to make us, 590 00:35:15,080 --> 00:35:20,205 you know, enter into much more individual ways of thinking about the world. 591 00:35:20,689 --> 00:35:22,490 Whereas there are other technologies, 592 00:35:22,490 --> 00:35:24,902 like the one that we're using to talk to each other, 593 00:35:24,902 --> 00:35:30,056 that can be helpful. And there is a point in having video conferences 594 00:35:30,117 --> 00:35:32,279 and having phones to connect. mean, 595 00:35:32,279 --> 00:35:34,461 of course, that can be helpful. 596 00:35:34,461 --> 00:35:37,123 But that's why we should make an analysis. 597 00:35:37,123 --> 00:35:42,328 OK, what technologies? What is the philosophy embedded with some technologies? 598 00:35:42,328 --> 00:35:44,009 And how can we promote 599 00:35:44,591 --> 00:35:50,016 the uses of one and restrict the ones that are contributing to make 600 00:35:50,016 --> 00:35:53,529 our society more individualistic and less connected. 601 00:35:55,920 --> 00:35:58,061 And if we think about the future, 602 00:35:58,061 --> 00:36:00,821 let's say, I know, in 10, 20 years, 603 00:36:00,821 --> 00:36:06,901 how do you imagine society if it goes in the way it is going now? 604 00:36:06,901 --> 00:36:10,461 And then also, 605 00:36:10,461 --> 00:36:15,281 how it could be society if it goes in a different way, 606 00:36:15,281 --> 00:36:20,021 so something more like something that you wish maybe. 607 00:36:22,013 --> 00:36:28,713 Yeah, look, I don't have a clear imaginary 608 00:36:28,713 --> 00:36:32,993 of how it should look like, but I do think that a 609 00:36:32,993 --> 00:36:38,113 key element in building a more democratic future is to 610 00:36:38,113 --> 00:36:42,173 try to understand the connections that exist between different 611 00:36:42,173 --> 00:36:45,833 but related struggles. And by this I mean, 612 00:36:45,833 --> 00:36:47,793 okay, you know, the question of technology, 613 00:36:47,793 --> 00:36:51,173 which I think is central to a lot of the questions about democracy, 614 00:36:51,557 --> 00:36:53,878 needs to be connected to, for example, 615 00:36:53,878 --> 00:36:56,640 anti-colonial movements like we're seeing in Palestine, 616 00:36:56,640 --> 00:37:00,762 where Israel is using technology in the violence that they are exerting, 617 00:37:00,762 --> 00:37:03,483 but it's also used, for example, 618 00:37:03,483 --> 00:37:06,215 in pursuing sexist violence, right, 619 00:37:06,215 --> 00:37:08,817 through a lot of, you know, social media, 620 00:37:08,817 --> 00:37:15,290 vitality, reproducing kind of stereotypes, 621 00:37:15,290 --> 00:37:16,290 and so on. 622 00:37:17,015 --> 00:37:20,736 It's also clearly used for discrimination and racism. 623 00:37:20,736 --> 00:37:26,508 We see that, for example, technology is being used to discriminate against migrants. 624 00:37:26,508 --> 00:37:31,859 Frontex is using lot of drones and other types of technology to basically make 625 00:37:31,859 --> 00:37:35,680 it as difficult as possible for migrants to enter the EU in the first place 626 00:37:35,680 --> 00:37:38,927 and so on. So that's why we need to see 627 00:37:39,257 --> 00:37:42,878 trace the connections and only by tracing these connections, 628 00:37:42,878 --> 00:37:45,279 I think we can build a better future together. 629 00:37:45,279 --> 00:37:47,850 So I'm hesitating to give you like a very, 630 00:37:47,850 --> 00:37:50,950 you know, okay, what's me as Alvaro, 631 00:37:50,950 --> 00:37:52,091 you know, think of the future, 632 00:37:52,091 --> 00:37:56,462 but I'm thinking of the ways in which we can collectively imagine 633 00:37:56,522 --> 00:38:00,283 a more democratic future. And I think this begins by acknowledging 634 00:38:00,283 --> 00:38:06,085 the structural inequalities and injustices that exist in our society. 635 00:38:06,345 --> 00:38:08,067 and doing something about it together. 636 00:38:08,067 --> 00:38:09,507 And I don't know, for example, 637 00:38:09,507 --> 00:38:13,610 in terms of technology, it is interesting that ~ some content moderators that were 638 00:38:13,610 --> 00:38:16,331 working for Meta, not directly, 639 00:38:16,331 --> 00:38:18,733 but through a contractor in Kenya, 640 00:38:18,733 --> 00:38:22,295 sued Meta because of unfair labor conditions. 641 00:38:22,295 --> 00:38:26,108 And this triggered as well that they unionized together with other content 642 00:38:26,108 --> 00:38:29,099 moderators, most of which are based in the global south, 643 00:38:29,099 --> 00:38:31,981 like Madagascar, Philippines, Venezuela. 644 00:38:32,485 --> 00:38:35,947 So they created ~ a global union of content moderators. 645 00:38:35,947 --> 00:38:37,238 I don't know how far it will go, 646 00:38:37,238 --> 00:38:41,841 but I think it's good starting point to think as well about 647 00:38:41,841 --> 00:38:43,993 the workers' rights dimension. 648 00:38:43,993 --> 00:38:46,454 Also the environmental struggles. 649 00:38:46,454 --> 00:38:52,398 So my pledge would be not so much about a very concrete type of future, 650 00:38:52,398 --> 00:38:56,760 but at least about how to think about imagining about the future. 651 00:38:57,144 --> 00:38:58,895 And if we want to think about that, 652 00:38:58,895 --> 00:39:01,056 we need to think about political economy. 653 00:39:01,056 --> 00:39:05,478 We need to think about the miners that are extracting the lithium in Bolivia, 654 00:39:05,478 --> 00:39:08,180 Chile and Venezuela. We need to think about the content moderators. 655 00:39:08,180 --> 00:39:10,191 We need to think about oppressed peoples, 656 00:39:10,191 --> 00:39:11,602 mostly in the global south, et cetera, 657 00:39:11,602 --> 00:39:17,535 et cetera. And only by seeing and tracing all these different communities that 658 00:39:17,535 --> 00:39:19,546 are affected, among other things, 659 00:39:19,546 --> 00:39:21,867 by technology, we will be able to imagine 660 00:39:22,027 --> 00:39:24,707 and deliver a better future, a more democratic one. 661 00:39:26,989 --> 00:39:27,989 Absolutely, 662 00:39:27,580 --> 00:39:29,996 because this all those... 663 00:39:32,781 --> 00:39:36,901 It's visible to the citizens, to the user that use the platform. 664 00:39:36,901 --> 00:39:40,981 So just use Facebook and they seems nice. 665 00:39:40,981 --> 00:39:45,601 Then we are not aware of all the people that maybe have to see horrible videos 666 00:39:45,601 --> 00:39:49,441 and check it or approve it or deny it. 667 00:39:49,441 --> 00:39:55,841 I don't know because I think that 668 00:39:58,861 --> 00:40:01,081 There is maybe a sort of tension. 669 00:40:01,081 --> 00:40:06,261 As I said, we do not need technology. 670 00:40:06,261 --> 00:40:08,401 There are lots of political innovation. 671 00:40:08,401 --> 00:40:12,021 are lots of... Also, let's say that technology do not exist. 672 00:40:12,021 --> 00:40:14,421 I mean, the technology that we know now, 673 00:40:14,421 --> 00:40:21,381 that we are used to use. We could do a lot for everything you mentioned. 674 00:40:21,381 --> 00:40:27,185 We could try to make the world a better place to make... 675 00:40:27,495 --> 00:40:31,136 in a way that people do not suffer or die or are exploited. 676 00:40:33,232 --> 00:40:39,114 And actually, as I said, maybe I have a little bit of faith because 677 00:40:39,454 --> 00:40:42,055 if I'm not sure, it means that I am faithful. 678 00:40:42,055 --> 00:40:48,711 And so it's also maybe a sort of way similar to religion has also ideologies could 679 00:40:48,711 --> 00:40:51,864 be. That maybe technology could help in... 680 00:40:51,864 --> 00:40:52,864 ~ 681 00:40:54,840 --> 00:40:58,031 coordinating maybe in terms of coordination. 682 00:41:00,610 --> 00:41:01,610 Okay. 683 00:41:01,622 --> 00:41:04,393 I agree. think it can help in terms of coordination, 684 00:41:04,393 --> 00:41:09,594 it needs to be clear. think that technology itself is not the solution 685 00:41:09,714 --> 00:41:15,896 to almost anything. It can be a means or it can help to coordinate. 686 00:41:15,896 --> 00:41:21,217 But that's why I am advocating for a kind of targeted usage 687 00:41:21,217 --> 00:41:24,058 of technology and targeted thinking of technology. 688 00:41:24,058 --> 00:41:26,939 I think there's a problem with this kind of... 689 00:41:27,213 --> 00:41:29,986 general purpose logic with which technology operates. 690 00:41:29,986 --> 00:41:32,149 Let's just use technology for everything. 691 00:41:32,149 --> 00:41:36,634 I think there are some uses that can be helpful for democracy and I think 692 00:41:36,634 --> 00:41:41,538 we should foster them, but I think technology by itself will not be 693 00:41:41,538 --> 00:41:43,261 the solution to almost anything. 694 00:41:46,065 --> 00:41:47,886 Absolutely. So it could be, mean, 695 00:41:47,886 --> 00:41:54,029 not a, not the solution. I wonder like you mentioned self-check in supermarket. 696 00:41:54,029 --> 00:41:58,331 Do you see them as something, let's say positive because, 697 00:41:58,331 --> 00:42:04,374 ~ so a human doesn't have to stay there doing something that now a machine can do, 698 00:42:04,374 --> 00:42:07,655 or do you see it as negative because it, 699 00:42:07,655 --> 00:42:10,446 let's say, steal, the job to a person. 700 00:42:13,150 --> 00:42:19,034 I I guess it depends. I don't have a direct answer on that specific kind of example. 701 00:42:19,034 --> 00:42:23,297 What I notice is the kind of bigger trends 702 00:42:23,377 --> 00:42:29,101 of individualizing society by preventing or making it more difficult 703 00:42:29,101 --> 00:42:31,822 to make connections between different people. 704 00:42:31,822 --> 00:42:34,563 I think there can be problems with 705 00:42:35,015 --> 00:42:36,936 with self-checks, but not just because of that. 706 00:42:36,936 --> 00:42:40,348 there's here, and I don't want to insist too much, 707 00:42:40,348 --> 00:42:44,441 but I think it's a reality. also have to look at also the political economy 708 00:42:44,441 --> 00:42:47,032 of most shopping stores, the Carrefour's and the, 709 00:42:47,032 --> 00:42:53,106 you know, so the problem is not so much whether I think this is, 710 00:42:53,106 --> 00:42:55,168 you know, there are cashiers or they are not cashiers. 711 00:42:55,168 --> 00:42:56,508 The problem is, okay, it's again, 712 00:42:56,508 --> 00:42:59,280 who is controlling, you know, is this accountable? 713 00:42:59,622 --> 00:43:03,174 So this, for example, I find very interesting and I haven't looked too much into it, 714 00:43:03,174 --> 00:43:05,146 but I would like to. Zoran Mandani, 715 00:43:05,146 --> 00:43:09,528 the mayor of New York, I think promised and I think he delivered creating 716 00:43:09,528 --> 00:43:12,650 a publicly owned shopping store. 717 00:43:12,650 --> 00:43:14,911 And I found that really interesting. 718 00:43:14,911 --> 00:43:18,003 And I think there might be some interesting solutions. 719 00:43:18,003 --> 00:43:23,117 And beginning from that, maybe you can have interesting conversations around 720 00:43:23,913 --> 00:43:26,314 OK, should we have cashiers? If so, 721 00:43:26,314 --> 00:43:28,085 in what role? And so on and so forth. 722 00:43:28,085 --> 00:43:32,837 So I think this is much bigger conversation that this is not just, 723 00:43:32,837 --> 00:43:36,269 OK, the machines are replacing humans, 724 00:43:36,269 --> 00:43:37,429 because it's not entirely true. 725 00:43:37,429 --> 00:43:40,141 What is happening is that other humans are replacing humans. 726 00:43:40,141 --> 00:43:42,662 So for example, you might have less cashiers, 727 00:43:42,662 --> 00:43:43,962 but you know what you have more? 728 00:43:43,962 --> 00:43:46,323 You have more people hired. 729 00:43:46,463 --> 00:43:49,665 in Madagascar, for example, doing video surveillance, 730 00:43:49,665 --> 00:43:53,307 like at a distance, you know. So you may have less, 731 00:43:53,307 --> 00:43:55,308 you know, workers there, but you have more. 732 00:43:55,308 --> 00:44:00,070 So, you know, it's a complex kind of thing that I think the only way to solve 733 00:44:00,070 --> 00:44:03,952 it is not just by saying, OK, I have this very specific solution, 734 00:44:03,952 --> 00:44:06,954 but think, OK, first, what is the political economy, 735 00:44:06,954 --> 00:44:09,996 you know, who is controlling and have collective discussions about 736 00:44:09,996 --> 00:44:11,557 how should we organise it otherwise? 737 00:44:12,441 --> 00:44:14,583 So it should not be up to me to decide, 738 00:44:14,583 --> 00:44:17,005 okay, you know, it's better to self-checkout or not, 739 00:44:17,005 --> 00:44:19,727 but more, okay, you know, what's, 740 00:44:19,727 --> 00:44:22,630 you know, how do we work to organize these stores? 741 00:44:22,630 --> 00:44:26,593 And not just leave it up to Carrefour to decide whether, 742 00:44:26,593 --> 00:44:30,596 you know, they would have self-checkouts because it just saves them money. 743 00:44:33,165 --> 00:44:35,545 I absolutely agree about having, 744 00:44:35,545 --> 00:44:37,146 let's say, collective discussion. 745 00:44:37,146 --> 00:44:39,647 This will be very important. And I think that... 746 00:44:42,509 --> 00:44:47,968 So in some way I'm also skeptical as I say regarding two small citizen assemblies 747 00:44:47,968 --> 00:44:53,869 that are done, I don't know, one time and the topic is decided by someone that maybe 748 00:44:53,869 --> 00:44:55,171 has some interest and so. 749 00:44:57,669 --> 00:45:04,251 But I wonder, because I see that a lot of people do not participate in politics, 750 00:45:04,251 --> 00:45:06,221 in their political life. Also, 751 00:45:06,221 --> 00:45:09,242 if they have something in their small town that doesn't work, 752 00:45:09,242 --> 00:45:12,933 they could, let's say, send an email to the mayor. 753 00:45:12,933 --> 00:45:19,315 They could, let's say, organize a very small movement of 20 people. 754 00:45:19,315 --> 00:45:22,956 But they don't do it. I mean, there are movements. 755 00:45:22,956 --> 00:45:24,637 There are people that send emails. 756 00:45:25,251 --> 00:45:28,504 But I will say that maybe they are just a small minority. 757 00:45:28,504 --> 00:45:31,286 wonder if these maybe, let's say, 758 00:45:31,286 --> 00:45:34,749 citizen assembly, but then it depends what we mean with citizen assembly. 759 00:45:34,749 --> 00:45:40,293 Or like other things could be maybe a sort of a sort 760 00:45:40,293 --> 00:45:46,578 of exercise to actually understand how people could have power. 761 00:45:46,578 --> 00:45:47,578 I don't know. 762 00:45:47,547 --> 00:45:52,672 Yeah, I my suggestion would be to not think so much of citizens as individuals, 763 00:45:52,672 --> 00:45:55,435 that they should be sending emails to the mayor. 764 00:45:55,435 --> 00:45:59,008 But how can we democratize collective actors? 765 00:45:59,008 --> 00:46:01,150 How can we democratize trade unions? 766 00:46:01,150 --> 00:46:05,985 How can we democratize political parties so that more people are part of them? 767 00:46:05,985 --> 00:46:10,720 And instead of, you know, me as an individual sending a letter to the mayor, 768 00:46:11,266 --> 00:46:15,408 that I am part of a union and then there is an issue with something and then 769 00:46:15,408 --> 00:46:19,790 I can raise it to the union and the union or you know a political party 770 00:46:19,870 --> 00:46:24,322 or civil society or you know an activist social movement group would be 771 00:46:24,322 --> 00:46:28,095 the one that would be sort of having this more direct relation with 772 00:46:28,095 --> 00:46:31,576 the public authorities because I think it's not just about 773 00:46:31,596 --> 00:46:35,298 the relation of individuals to public authorities but more the relation of 774 00:46:35,378 --> 00:46:39,579 collective actors to public authorities that I think matters crucially 775 00:46:39,579 --> 00:46:44,571 for democracy. Of course, there are important individual rights that have 776 00:46:44,571 --> 00:46:50,003 to be respected, but I think that ultimately when we have had advances in democracy, 777 00:46:50,003 --> 00:46:51,764 it's because people organize collectively. 778 00:46:51,764 --> 00:46:54,885 It's because people, know, how did women, 779 00:46:54,885 --> 00:46:57,235 you know, get the right to vote because 780 00:46:57,863 --> 00:47:02,735 women organized? How did workers rights get 40 hours weeks? 781 00:47:02,735 --> 00:47:04,996 Because they organized and they organized protests 782 00:47:04,996 --> 00:47:06,317 and they organized demonstrations. 783 00:47:06,317 --> 00:47:12,941 And ~ if we do not organize collectively and raise these things in this way, 784 00:47:12,941 --> 00:47:16,663 it will be very easy for states to divide and conquer. 785 00:47:16,663 --> 00:47:19,685 And you should just think about yourself as an individual. 786 00:47:20,513 --> 00:47:26,750 instead of thinking of ourselves as part of bigger groups and operate politically. 787 00:47:30,679 --> 00:47:32,783 That is hard to do it as a group, 788 00:47:35,728 --> 00:47:36,728 But that's 789 00:47:36,018 --> 00:47:38,970 why, rather than thinking about citizen assemblies, 790 00:47:38,970 --> 00:47:43,614 I would rather advocate, how can we think of democratizing collective actors? 791 00:47:43,614 --> 00:47:48,558 Why instead of just organizing a citizen assembly about food waste like 792 00:47:48,558 --> 00:47:50,800 the commission did, or AI or whatever, 793 00:47:50,800 --> 00:47:55,153 why are we not pushing for having bigger unions with more members, 794 00:47:55,153 --> 00:47:56,604 but that they are also more democratic? 795 00:47:56,800 --> 00:48:01,221 It's true that there are some undemocratic tendencies in most unions 796 00:48:01,221 --> 00:48:04,302 or political parties. So they are, 797 00:48:04,302 --> 00:48:07,243 of course, not absent of some authoritarian dynamics. 798 00:48:07,243 --> 00:48:11,484 But I see more hope in trying to democratize them and mobilizing 799 00:48:11,484 --> 00:48:17,626 and organizing with people that are like-minded to do that rather than, 800 00:48:17,626 --> 00:48:18,967 OK, just to me, 801 00:48:19,469 --> 00:48:22,601 What Cristina Lafont says in that sense is correct in the sense that 802 00:48:23,002 --> 00:48:24,843 a lot of citizen assemblies are a shortcut. 803 00:48:24,843 --> 00:48:28,005 It's like, OK, you know, it's very difficult to organize and so on. 804 00:48:28,005 --> 00:48:29,677 Let's just do a citizen assembly and then, 805 00:48:29,677 --> 00:48:31,498 hey, we have the democratic legitimacy. 806 00:48:31,498 --> 00:48:32,789 But that's a shortcut that is, 807 00:48:32,789 --> 00:48:35,371 in my view, actually quite undemocratic. 808 00:48:37,327 --> 00:48:42,667 And do you have a message to the people that 809 00:48:42,667 --> 00:48:46,287 are working in the field of democratic innovation, 810 00:48:46,287 --> 00:48:48,687 maybe also on citizen assessment, 811 00:48:48,687 --> 00:48:52,527 maybe on different things regarding democratic innovation? 812 00:48:52,527 --> 00:48:55,647 yeah, 813 00:48:55,647 --> 00:48:57,867 if you have a message to them, 814 00:48:57,867 --> 00:48:58,867 for them. 815 00:49:00,283 --> 00:49:02,644 Yeah, mean, my main message is, 816 00:49:02,644 --> 00:49:05,366 yeah, let's focus on collective actors. 817 00:49:05,366 --> 00:49:09,748 Let's focus on those actors that have historically been able 818 00:49:09,748 --> 00:49:14,330 to make democracy better. And we have not done that quietly. 819 00:49:14,330 --> 00:49:16,481 We have done that by making noise, 820 00:49:16,481 --> 00:49:19,452 by organizing, by going to protests. 821 00:49:19,452 --> 00:49:20,452 ~ 822 00:49:20,304 --> 00:49:24,256 and by building strong collective movements that ~ have been able 823 00:49:24,256 --> 00:49:30,490 to represent white constituencies rather than focusing uniquely on a small group 824 00:49:30,490 --> 00:49:35,292 of individuals. So that is sort of my plea and yeah, 825 00:49:35,292 --> 00:49:40,214 let's make the connections that exist and try to connect those struggles that might 826 00:49:40,214 --> 00:49:44,367 be different because I do not have the same struggles as some migrant women might 827 00:49:44,367 --> 00:49:45,958 have. But nonetheless, 828 00:49:46,240 --> 00:49:51,375 my struggles are also connected to people that are struggling in different ways. 829 00:49:51,375 --> 00:49:56,501 And we should find ways ~ and spaces to discuss those 830 00:49:56,501 --> 00:50:01,596 ~ struggles and act politically together as much as it is possible. 831 00:50:03,589 --> 00:50:05,755 Thank you, Aldaro. And Adonai, 832 00:50:05,755 --> 00:50:07,820 should like to add anything else? 833 00:50:08,950 --> 00:50:13,394 No, I'm not sure I have anything more to say. 834 00:50:13,394 --> 00:50:14,576 yeah, thanks a lot, Alessandro. 835 00:50:14,576 --> 00:50:16,788 It was really a pleasure to have this discussion. 836 00:50:17,346 --> 00:50:18,517 Thank you. Also for me.