The rise of digital eco-technocracy: Ecological crisis, digital innovation and legitimacy in the adaptive society

This paper examines the convergence of digitalization and ecological sustainability within the framework of “digital eco-technocracy” analyzing its implications for legitimacy. We first elaborate the reasons why we believe that adaptation is increasingly becoming an essential leitmotiv of social integration and transformation. We then argue that the convergence of digital and green has the potential to fundamentally reshape the relationship between politics and society in terms of political legitimacy. In doing so we claim that the integration of digital and green agendas may transform liberal democracies into adaptive, technocratic systems focused on depoliticizing ecological conflicts via digital technologies. Drawing on critical theory, particularly Claus Offe's work on technocratic dilemmas, we then propose a “negative dialectic of technocracy,” where efforts to stabilize society through technocratic solutions risk further legitimacy crises, but in doing so further strengthen technocratic trajectories.