Digitalization, artificial intelligence, and new technologies have become central in how European welfare states evolve and the way they are governed. These technologies can open new horizons to meet existing social risks and make the administration faster and more cost-efficient. Yet, technological change can strengthen old divides and stir conflicts: technologies may extend the divides between different groups in society and give a rise to new societal problems by marginalizing groups of people.
CEDIC Talks aim to broaden our knowledge and awareness about ongoing research in Europe about digitalization processes and their social consequences. In this lecture, the social policy professor Minna van Gerven from Tampere University will discuss technological change as a modernization process of welfare states that may foster inequalities. She will draw attention to the politics and policies of digital welfare states in Finland and to the way the digitalization of welfare systems may uphold both visible and invisible inequalities.