Digital Social Policy: Past, Present, Future

We undoubtably live in a digitally infused world. From government administrative processes to financial transactions and social media posts, digital technologies automatically collect, collate, combine and circulate digital traces of our actions and thoughts, which are in turn used to construct digital personas of us. More significantly, government decisions are increasingly automated with real world effect; companies subvert human workers to automated processes; while social media algorithms prioritise outrage and ‘fake news’ with destabilizing and devastating effects for public trust in social institutions. Accordingly, what it means to be a person, a citizen, and a consumer, and what constitutes society and the economy in the 21 st century is profoundly different to that in the 20 th century.