Building Global Societies on Collective Intelligence: Challenges and Opportunities

Digital disruptions caused by the use of technologies like social media arguably present a formidable challenge to democratic values and in turn to collective intelligence. Challenges such as misinformation, partisan bias, polarization, and rising mistrust in institutions (including mainstream media) present a new constant threat to collectives both online and offline—amplifying the risk of turning ‘wise’ crowds ‘mad’ and rendering their actions counterproductive. Considering the increasingly important role crowds play in solving today’s socio-political, technological, and economical issues, and in shaping our future, it is vital to protect crowd-oriented systems against such disruptions. In this commentary, we identify time-critical challenges and potential solutions from emerging work on diversity, transparency, collective dynamics, and machine behavior that require urgent attention if future collective intelligence systems are to sustain their indispensable role as global deliberation instruments.