Rethinking participatory technology assessment in security governance = Neue Ansätze zur partizipativen Technikfolgenabschätzung in der Sicherheitsgovernance

This article explores participatory technology assessment(pTA) in security contexts and asks whether it has a purely symbolicfunction or whether it can enable real democratic influence. Googles’involvement in the U.S. military’s Project Maven serves as an example.At the time, Google employees publicly protested against their com-pany’s involvement in the military use of its AI, leading Google to dropits contract with the Pentagon. However, a literature review has shownthat secrecy and power asymmetries are typical characteristics of se-curity innovations, so formal pTA rarely goes beyond symbolic politics.Nonetheless,conflictssuchasthesecanopenupopportunitiesforpub-lic scrutiny and democratic influence.