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Civic Interplay is a space for reflection on a basic question: What does it mean to become-citizen in an era of planetary intelligence and sovereign AI?
It's a kind of micro politics for a macro age.
It's a kind of micro politics for a macro age.
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Civic Interplay is all work in progress.
This work is emerging as we speak. Its formal practices are yet to be discerned. This is not a space where outcomes are pre-determined.
This work is emerging as we speak. Its formal practices are yet to be discerned. This is not a space where outcomes are pre-determined.
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The 'Macro Age' We're Living Through
We are living through the Sixth Mass Extinction, the rise of AI sovereignty, and a series of catastrophic climate tipping points.
This is not an era that we understand very well, though it may strike us as dangerous. These crises don't respect national borders. They can't be solved by individual nation-states acting alone. They're being shaped, in no small part, by planetary-scale digital infrastructures that govern information, computation, and increasingly, co-intelligence.
We are living through the Sixth Mass Extinction, the rise of AI sovereignty, and a series of catastrophic climate tipping points.
This is not an era that we understand very well, though it may strike us as dangerous. These crises don't respect national borders. They can't be solved by individual nation-states acting alone. They're being shaped, in no small part, by planetary-scale digital infrastructures that govern information, computation, and increasingly, co-intelligence.
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In this macro age, the language of 'citizenship' may not feel adequate.
It may feel better suited to other times, times different to our own. From these other times we inherited a political world order that enabled many to live comfortably in recent decades. To think little of politics, and of what it means to act as citizens.
From these other times we almost reached the end of history.
It may feel better suited to other times, times different to our own. From these other times we inherited a political world order that enabled many to live comfortably in recent decades. To think little of politics, and of what it means to act as citizens.
From these other times we almost reached the end of history.
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The macro age we find ourselves in is creating, before our eyes, a different kind of history.
It's not the kind of history we were taught before. We can no longer say: And then they lived comfortably ever after.
We are not so sure of that any more.
It's not the kind of history we were taught before. We can no longer say: And then they lived comfortably ever after.
We are not so sure of that any more.
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But we can say: We are the interface for a new politics of becoming.
By 'interface' I mean something specific: we are the living, sensing, semi-autonomous connection between the world as it has been and the world as it might become.
Through our daily choices, about which platforms to use, which data to share, which automated systems to trust or resist, what terms and conditions we say yes to, we are actively training the planetary intelligences that shape material futures.
By 'interface' I mean something specific: we are the living, sensing, semi-autonomous connection between the world as it has been and the world as it might become.
Through our daily choices, about which platforms to use, which data to share, which automated systems to trust or resist, what terms and conditions we say yes to, we are actively training the planetary intelligences that shape material futures.
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This is the micro-politics of civic interplay.
Beyond legacy models
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The language of digital computing is suffused with legacy models:
'Cloud computing'—as though our data had no weight, no carbon cost, no material infrastructure spanning the earth
'Human-centred design'—as though humans are the only thing that matters in a more-than-human world facing ecological collapse
'Artificial intelligence'—as though it is somehow not real, or not borne of the collective wealth of knowledge
'Information design'—as though designing how information flows were not also political acts
'Cloud computing'—as though our data had no weight, no carbon cost, no material infrastructure spanning the earth
'Human-centred design'—as though humans are the only thing that matters in a more-than-human world facing ecological collapse
'Artificial intelligence'—as though it is somehow not real, or not borne of the collective wealth of knowledge
'Information design'—as though designing how information flows were not also political acts
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What about instead:
Our interconnected lives operate as training grounds for a new kind of planetary intelligence. The question is not whether we'll have planetary-scale AI systems—we already do—but what kind of citizens we'll be in relation to them.
Our interconnected lives operate as training grounds for a new kind of planetary intelligence. The question is not whether we'll have planetary-scale AI systems—we already do—but what kind of citizens we'll be in relation to them.
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What about instead:
The institutions to which we owe our allegiance and identities as citizens are becoming strange.
It is not only 'governments' as we have known them, but 'governing bodies'—extending beyond these formal states—upon which we have become interdependent, in both cognitive and infrastructural ways.
The institutions to which we owe our allegiance and identities as citizens are becoming strange.
It is not only 'governments' as we have known them, but 'governing bodies'—extending beyond these formal states—upon which we have become interdependent, in both cognitive and infrastructural ways.
Training grounds for micro-political imaginaries
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If planetary institutions govern the digital world, and the digital world increasingly structures the material conditions of the physical world, what is the politics of planetary democracy? Does that exist?
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If contemporary citizenship builds on a history of political trauma - the trauma of past lives lost for the sake of political freedom - what kinds of citizens are we refusing to be, if we refuse to try to imagine another digital world order?
To refuse the work of imagination is to accept the world as given by those who are already building it. But imagination requires practice. It requires spaces to think differently, to experiment with alternative relations, to repair what has been damaged.
This is where the micro-politics of civic interplay begins: not in grand manifestos or total system redesigns, but in smaller acts of intentionally crafting different relations. In what data we choose to make visible or keep private. In what level of energy goes into algorithm training, versus local ecological repair. In which forms of intelligence—human, artificial, ecological—we invite into our decision-making processes, and on what terms.
To refuse the work of imagination is to accept the world as given by those who are already building it. But imagination requires practice. It requires spaces to think differently, to experiment with alternative relations, to repair what has been damaged.
This is where the micro-politics of civic interplay begins: not in grand manifestos or total system redesigns, but in smaller acts of intentionally crafting different relations. In what data we choose to make visible or keep private. In what level of energy goes into algorithm training, versus local ecological repair. In which forms of intelligence—human, artificial, ecological—we invite into our decision-making processes, and on what terms.
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What counts as an act of politics, when digital scrolling places us in the crosshairs of a cybernetically-engineered system we didn't realise we'd sworn allegiance to?
Seeking spaces of civil repair
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The word civic is related to another word: civil. Both words relate to a Latin word, civis, or citizenship.
These words speak to how we relate to each other as citizens (being civil), and how we structure and govern these relations, through rights, duties and the functioning of public spaces (civics).
To be a civis, in the ancient sense, was to be a member of an 'imagined community' - in the specific sense, a citizen of Rome.
Our imagined communities today contain multitudes: of species, of co-intelligences.
These words speak to how we relate to each other as citizens (being civil), and how we structure and govern these relations, through rights, duties and the functioning of public spaces (civics).
To be a civis, in the ancient sense, was to be a member of an 'imagined community' - in the specific sense, a citizen of Rome.
Our imagined communities today contain multitudes: of species, of co-intelligences.
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How do we craft the workflows and digital relations that shape what kinds of 'imagined community' we belong to?
These are micro political acts; acts of civic interplay.
These are micro political acts; acts of civic interplay.
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Civic Interplay sees micro-acts of political belonging being forged in the training grounds of co-intelligent habitats.
About the lead author
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Civic Interplay is led by scholar-practitioner Sarah Barns.
As well as her scholarship and strategy work, she is the founder of STORYBOX.CO and Studio ESEM. She has been living and working in the City of Bits for the past 30 years. She may or may not be a political philosopher of urban technology.
Her present day research-practice is supported by RMIT University under its Vice Chancellor's Senior Research Fellowship Scheme.
Contact Sarah here
As well as her scholarship and strategy work, she is the founder of STORYBOX.CO and Studio ESEM. She has been living and working in the City of Bits for the past 30 years. She may or may not be a political philosopher of urban technology.
Her present day research-practice is supported by RMIT University under its Vice Chancellor's Senior Research Fellowship Scheme.
Contact Sarah here
Read more
Learning to be Planetary Citizens: An Introduction
Somehow, in the not too distant past, who we are as citizens changed. Our allegiances shifted, our field of vision changed. Our everyday sensory realities morphed. Somehow, we became citizens of a different kind of political order. Through this change, we became citizens of novel training grounds for a new
Sarah Barns
They gathered inside a makeshift structure at De Ceuvel.
Irina was there to hug people on arrival. There were no strangers, though many had not yet met. Some had cycled here from nearby, others had left their bicycles at home, flown by aircraft, walked, caught the train across Europe.
Sarah Barns
Learning to be Planetary Citizens: An Introduction
Somehow, in the not too distant past, who we are as citizens changed. Our allegiances shifted, our field of vision changed. Our everyday sensory realities morphed. Somehow, we became citizens of a different kind of political order. Through this change, we became citizens of novel training grounds for a new