Anonymity, fidelity to law, and digital Civil disobedience

Abstract

Making use of the liberal concept of civil disobedience, this paper assesses, under which circumstances instances of illegal digital protest—called “hacktivism”—can be justified vis-à-vis the pro tanto political obligation to obey the law. For this, the paper draws on the three main criteria for liberal civil disobedience—publicity, nonviolence, and fidelity to law—and examines how these can be transferred to the realm of the digital. One of the main disanalogies between street and cyberspace protests is the tendency of hacktivists to remain anonymous, which in turn calls into question their fidelity to law (the third criterion). The paper argues that there are functionally equivalent alternatives to what can be called the “acceptance-of-legal-consequences-condition” (ALCC) associated with the fidelity to law. As a result, the ALCC is not a necessary condition for hacktivists to showcase their fidelity to law, thereby resolving the apparent disanalogy.

The Crucial Role of Court Proceedings Reports in Criminal Case Proceedings and the Dilemma of Judicial Decision-Making

“…Within it, various interaction processes occur among litigation actors, contributing to law enforcement and the convergence of conflicting interests (Rahardjo, 2006). Judges, as members of the community, must be able to fully comprehend the facts of the trial and render decisions that adhere to the trias politica of certainty, propriety, and justice, in the spirit of a la Gustav Radbuch (Loh, 2023).…”