What happens to democracy and free speech if people use the Internet to create echo chambers--to listen and speak only to the like-minded? What is the democratic benefit of the Internet's unlimited choices if citizens narrowly limit the information they receive, creating ever-smaller niches and fragmenting the shared public conversation on which democracy depends? Cass Sunstein first asked these questions before 9/11, in Republic.com, and they have become even more urgent in the years since. Now, in Republic.com 2.0, Sunstein thoroughly rethinks the critical relationship between democracy and the Internet in a world where partisan Web logs have emerged as a significant force in politics and where cyber-jihadists have embraced the Internet to thwart democracy and spread violence. Emphasizing the value of unplanned, unchosen encounters, the original Republic.com provoked a strong reaction from cyber-optimists. In Republic.com 2.0 Sunstein answers the critics and expands his argument to take account of new developments, including the blogosphere, and fresh evidence about how people are using the Internet. He demonstrates that the real question is how to avoid "information cocoons" and to ensure that the unrestricted choices made possible by technology do not undermine democracy. Sunstein also proposes new remedies and reforms--focusing far less on what government should do, and much more on what consumers and producers should do--to help democracy avoid the perils, and realize the promise, of the Internet.

"As the Internet grows more sophisticated, it is creating new threats to democracy. Social media companies such as Facebook can sort us ever more efficiently into groups of the like-minded, creating echo chambers that amplify our views. It's no accident that on some occasions, people of different political views cannot even understand each other. It's also no surprise that terrorist groups have been able to exploit social media to deadly effect. Welcome to the age of #Republic. In this revealing book, Cass Sunstein, the New York Times bestselling author of Nudge and The World According to Star Wars, shows how today's Internet is driving political fragmentation, polarization, and even extremism--and what can be done about it. Thoroughly rethinking the critical relationship between democracy and the Internet, Sunstein describes how the online world creates "cybercascades," exploits "confirmation bias," and assists "polarization entrepreneurs." And he explains why online fragmentation endangers the shared conversations, experiences, and understandings that are the lifeblood of democracy. In response, Sunstein proposes practical and legal changes to make the Internet friendlier to democratic deliberation. These changes would get us out of our information cocoons by increasing the frequency of unchosen, unplanned encounters and exposing us to people, places, things, and ideas that we would never have picked for our Twitter feed. #Republic need not be an ironic term. As Sunstein shows, it can be a rallying cry for the kind of democracy that citizens of diverse societies most need. "--

Many of us are being misled. Claiming to know the “pals” of presidential aspirants, dark secrets about public officials, and hidden causes of the current economic crisis, those who spread rumors know precisely what they are doing. They are sometimes able to derail political candidates, injure companies and reputations, even damage democratic governance. And in the era of the Internet, they know more about manipulating the mechanics of false rumors—social cascades, group polarization, and biased assimilation—than you do. They also know that the presumed correctives—publishing balanced information, issuing corrections, and trusting to the marketplace of ideas—do not always work. A pioneer in the effort “to design regulation around the ways people behave” ( The Wall Street Journal ), Cass R. Sunstein uses examples from the real world and from behavioral studies to explain why certain rumors spread like wildfire and what we can do to avoid being misled.

See only what you want to see, hear only what you want to hear, read only what you want to read. In cyberspace, we already have the ability to filter out everything but what we wish to see, hear, and read. Tomorrow, our power to filter promises to increase exponentially. With the advent of the Daily Me, you see only the sports highlights that concern your teams, read about only the issues that interest you, encounter in the op-ed pages only the opinions with which you agree. In all of the applause for this remarkable ascendance of personalized information, Cass Sunstein asks the questions, Is it good for democracy? Is it healthy for the republic? What does this mean for freedom of speech? Republic.com exposes the drawbacks of egocentric Internet use, while showing us how to approach the Internet as responsible citizens, not just concerned consumers. Democracy, Sunstein maintains, depends on shared experiences and requires citizens to be exposed to topics and ideas that they would not have chosen in advance. Newspapers and broadcasters helped create a shared culture, but as their role diminishes and the customization of our communications universe increases, society is in danger of fragmenting, shared communities in danger of dissolving. In their place will arise only louder and ever more extreme echoes of our own voices, our own opinions. In evaluating the consequences of new communications technologies for democracy and free speech, Sunstein argues the question is not whether to regulate the Net (it's already regulated), but how; proves that freedom of speech is not an absolute; and underscores the enormous potential of the Internet to promote freedom as well as its potential to promote "cybercascades" of like-minded opinions that foster and enflame hate groups. The book ends by suggesting a range of potential reforms to correct current misconceptions and to improve deliberative democracy and the health of the American republic. Chat with Cass Sunstein in a Message Forum hosted beginning April 1, 2001.

As the dire history of planned economies highlights, small well-informed groups of people will often make far worse decisions than large numbers of people, acting independently, would make. In Infotopia, Cass Sunstein looks at the "wisdom of the many"--particularly as seen on today's Internet--illuminating many new ways of collecting and evaluating information and making effective decisions. Sunstein shows how the on-line efforts of many people coming together help companies, schools, governments, and individuals to amass ever-growing bodies of accurate knowledge. He describes for instance how Wikipedia, through an endless flurry of self-correcting exchanges, collects information on everything from politics and business to science fiction. Open-source software--which licenses programmers to use, change, and improve the software--taps the power of large numbers of people to spur technological development. And prediction markets--such as the famous Iowa Electronic Market, where people bet real money on the outcome of local and national elections--collect information in a way that allows companies, ranging from computer makers to Hollywood studios, to make better decisions about the future. Sunstein reveals why these revolutionary new methods are so astoundingly accurate and he also shows how people can take advantage of "the wisdom of the many" without succumbing to the dangers of herd mentality. "Sunstein, one of the biggest of America's internet big thinkers, has written an intriguing new book in which he argues that Hayek's insights about the genius of markets are equally true of the internet." --Patti Waldmeir, Financial Times "This extraordinary work synthesizes the latest in how we know, with the latest in what the web has become, to map more compellingly than any other book the promise and risk of the information society." --Lawrence Lessig, author of Free Culture and The Future of Ideas "Vivid, readable, and informativea show-me-the-money guide to what soars and what stumbles from the stable of Internet dreams." --Jedediah Purdy, American Prospect "Sunstein, one of the biggest of America's internet big thinkers, has written an intriguing new book in which he argues that Hayek's insights about the genius of markets are equally true of the internet. Sunstein argues, for example, that sharing scientific information online would cure some of the worst problems of the US patent system and foster innovation much more efficiently than costly patent litigation. Sunstein recognizes all the potential flaws of such collaborative projects. Groupthink can be dangerous. But, says Sunstein, the wisdom of the many is a great thing, and sharing knowledge online can lead to remarkable advances for companies, for governments and for the rest of us."--Patti Waldmeir, Financial Times "A survey of the evidence on how information technology affects political debate and institutional decision making. The result is a vivid, readable, and informative work of empiricist skepticism--a show-me-the-money guide to what soars and what stumbles from the stable of Internet dreams."--Jedediah Purdy, merican Prospect, Duke University "This extraordinary work synthesizes the latest in how we know, with the latest in what the web has become, to map more compellingly than any other book the promise and risk of the information society. As with everything Sunstein writes, this beautiful and clear book has something to teach the experts, and lots to teach the rest of us."-Lawrence Lessig, author of Free Culture and The Future of Ideas "Infotopia is a persuasive and sophisticated meditation on the ways in which the Web is not just living up to its early hype, but transcending it. Cass Sunstein has given us a brilliant integrative view of how the distributed users of the Internet can band together to produce extraordinary work--along with the circumstances that best give rise to deliberation r

"In modern nations, political disagreement is the source of both the gravest danger and the greatest security," writes Cass Sunstein. All democracies face intense political conflict. But is this conflict necessarily something to fear? In this provocative book, one of our leading political and legal theorists reveals how a nation's divisions of conviction and belief can be used to safeguard democracy.Confronting one explosive political issue after another, from presidential impeachment to the limits of religious liberty, from discrimination against women and gays to the role of the judiciary, Sunstein constructs a powerful new perspective from which to show how democracies negotiate their most divisive real-world problems. He focuses on a series of concrete concerns that go to the heart of the relationship between the idea of democracy and the idea of constitutionalism. Illustrating his discussion with examples from constitutional debates and court-cases in South Africa, Eastern Europe, Israel, America, and elsewhere, Sunstein takes readers through a number of highly charged questions: When should government be permitted to control discriminatory behavior by or within religious organizations? Does it make sense to govern on the basis of popular referenda? Can the right to have an abortion be defended? Can we defend Internet regulation? Should the law step in if children are being schooled in discriminatory preferences and beliefs? Should a constitution protect rights to food, shelter, and health care?Disputes over questions such as these can be fierce enough to pose a grave threat. But in a paradox whose elaboration forms the core of Sunstein's book, it is a nation's apparently threatening diversity of opinion that can ensure its integrity.Extending his important recent work on the way deliberation within like-minded groups can produce extremism, Sunstein breaks new ground in identifying the mechanisms behind political conflict in democratic nations. At the same time, he develops a profound understanding of a constitutional democracy's system of checks and balances. Sunstein shows how a good constitution, fostering a "republic of reasons," enables people of opposing ethical and religious commitments to reach agreement where agreement is necessary, while making it unnecessary to reach agreement when agreement is impossible.A marvel of lucid, subtle reasoning, DESIGNING DEMOCRACY makes invaluable reading for anyone concerned with the promises and pitfalls of the democratic experiment.