The internal Turn of Democracy. The Assange Case
by Antonio Martone
pp. 296-314 Issue 18 (9,2) – July-December 2022 ISSN (online): 2539/2239 ISSN (print): 2389-8232 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.14718/SoftPower.2022.9.2.15
Abstract
The essay wonders to what extent liberal democratic systems can be separated, in relation to freedom, from autocratic power devices. One of the analysis criteria followed by the A., is constituted by the story that saw as protagonist the activist Julian Assange. The Australian journalist, showed the very close bond between power and Internet communication nowadays, and the libertarian potentialities hidden in this bond. He also pointed out the existence of a “subversion” level that Occidental systems are not willing to tolerate, because even in them, as in any other power device, there is a need for survival that makes use of specific, well-defined and unavoidable immune mechanisms.
In the essay, finally, we analyze the problematization of the concept of freedom, and its political operability, facing the danger of conformism, media manipulation and depoliticization always looming in democracies.