eFin & Democracy invites an interdisciplinary panel of experts twice a year. The meetings offer an independent place to reflect on issues regarding the sociopolitical aspects of digital change in the financial sector. Its aim is a well-informed and critical exchange that brings together not only academic, but also relevant positions from financial market-related, cultural and journalistic practice. Civic engagement, digital political democratization, orientation towards the common good and a sense of responsibility form the horizon in which the considerations and activities of “Money – Technology – Democracy” are located.
The panel currently consists of the following members:
- Dr. Martin Diehl (Analyst for financial market infrastructures at the Deutsche Bundesbank)
- Prof. Dr. Petra Gehring (Professor of Philosophy at TU Darmstadt, Scientific Director of ZEVEDI (Centre for Responsible Digitality) and Head of the “eFin & Democracy” discourse project)
- Johannes Kuhn (journalist in the Berlin studio of Deutschlandfunk with a focus on digitalization policy)
- Prof. Dr. Aaron Sahr (Research Group Monetary Sovereignty at the Hamburg Institute for Social Research and Visiting Professor at the Institute for Sociology and Cultural Organization at the Leuphana University of Lüneburg)
- Prof. Dr. Daniel Tyradellis (Humboldt Forum Endowed Professorship for the Theory and Practice of Interdisciplinary Curating, funded by the Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media; Vice Director of the Hermann von Helmholtz Centre for Cultural Technology at HU Berlin)
Following a constituent meeting on March 14/15, 2023 at the Forum Humanwissenschaften, Bad Homburg, the group met for discussions on October 5/6, 2023 at the Darmstadt Wasserturm (photo). On April 12, 2024, it met at the Helmholtz Center for Cultural Technology at the HU Berlin.
It was decided to focus first on the digital euro. With the introduction of a central bank digital currency (CBDC) in the eurozone currently in preparation, technological issues relating to the specific design of the new money converge with the question of how aspects of “democracy” are affected. The panel of experts has therefore decided to first look at the digital euro, also with regard to a (public) infrastructure for digital payment transactions and the associated transparency and comprehensibility of the introduction process for citizens, which is absolutely essential. The panel will develop ideas for relevant features of the digital euro. It will also discuss ways of communicatively supporting the political-administrative process beyond conventional communication formats.
