Artificial Intelligence Politicking and Human Rights Violations in UK’s Democracy: A Critical Appraisal of the Brexit Referendum

Abstract

Following the testimonies of Shaimaire Sanni about the negative wanton use of artificial intelligence (AI) politicking approaches by the Vote-leave group during the 2016 Brexit referendum, the decision by Great Britain (GB) to leave the European Union (EU) had stirred up heated controversies about what would have really been the outcome of the Brexit deal if the Vote-leave group had not cheated with AI politicking systems. Hence, the act of cheating via this platform and the violation of Brexit spending regulations, human rights activists (HRA) like Sanni and Wylie believed, delegitimize the results of the votes obtained for Brexit and for UK’s institutions of democracy. Others argue that the allegations raised against the Brexit referendum process justify the agitations for a second Brexit referendum by a section of UK citizens. The Marxian alienation theory and Derrida’s critical and analytical method for evaluating qualitative data and arguments gathered on the subject matter of the paper were adopted, with the view to ascertaining the degree of AI politicking approaches that altered the results of UK’s Brexit referendum. Marilyn’s ex-post facto research method was also utilized for interrogating the integrity of UK’s democracy in the light of the allegations raised against it. The study observed that most of the allegations raised against UK’s Brexit referendum process had merits to their claims, thus justifying their request for a fresh referendum. A positive implementation of AI politicking methods from ethical perspectives was recommended against the current reckless methods adopted by political campaigners.