The Dog That Didn’t Bark: Looking for Techno-Libertarian Ideology in a Decade of Public Discourse about Big Tech Regulation

Ohio State Technology Law Journal, Forthcoming

UC Hastings Research Paper Forthcoming

MIT Sloan Research Paper 6878-22

44 Pages Posted: 26 Sep 2022 Last revised: 12 May 2023

See all articles by Jodi L. Short

Jodi L. Short

UC Law, San Francisco

Reuel Schiller

UC Law, San Francisco

Susan S. Silbey

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan School of Management

Noah Jones

Independent

Babak Hemmatian

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

LeeAnna Bowman-Carpio

UC Law, San Francisco

Date Written: August 26, 2022

Abstract

The internet was built on the techno-libertarian ideology that “information wants to be free,” and that ideology has played a prominent role in academic and policy debates about regulating the internet and the big technology companies that dominate it. Techno-libertarian ideology has generated a constellation of claims about tech and regulation—from the suggestion that regulation will stifle innovation in the complex, dynamic tech sector, to the assertion that the large platform companies are literally unregulable. In this article, we explore how much traction such claims and ideologies have in the broader public discourse about big tech and regulation. We employ an innovative methodology—topic modeling—to track public discourse on the regulation of big technology from 2010 to 2020. We find that techno-libertarian ideas about free markets and information freedom play a surprisingly small role in this discourse. Indeed, we find that the most common themes in the discourse about big tech and regulation concern: calls to regulate big tech companies; growing critiques of technology’s influence in society; and declining discussion of the tech sector as a driver of economic growth. Our findings should embolden legal and policy advocates to pursue regulatory initiatives aimed at addressing the social and economic harms produced by the technology sector knowing that the techno-libertarian rhetoric likely to be deployed against them may not have sufficient public traction to win the day.

Keywords: regulation, technology, libertarian ideology

Suggested Citation

Short, Jodi L. and Schiller, Reuel and Silbey, Susan S. and Jones, Noah and Hemmatian, Babak and Bowman-Carpio, LeeAnna, The Dog That Didn’t Bark: Looking for Techno-Libertarian Ideology in a Decade of Public Discourse about Big Tech Regulation (August 26, 2022). Ohio State Technology Law Journal, Forthcoming, UC Hastings Research Paper Forthcoming, MIT Sloan Research Paper 6878-22, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4200916

Jodi L. Short (Contact Author)

UC Law, San Francisco ( email )

200 McAllister Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
United States

Reuel Schiller

UC Law, San Francisco ( email )

200 McAllister Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
United States

Susan S. Silbey

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) - Sloan School of Management ( email )

77 Massachusetts Avenue
50 Memorial Drive
Cambridge, MA 02139-4307
United States

Noah Jones

Independent ( email )

Babak Hemmatian

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign ( email )

601 E John St
Champaign, IL Champaign 61820
United States

LeeAnna Bowman-Carpio

UC Law, San Francisco

200 McAllister Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
United States

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