978-1-6654-1645-0/21/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE Societal security and trust in digital societies: a socio-technical perspective Jonathan Muringani Department of Technology Systems University of Oslo Oslo, Norway Jonathan.Muringani@its.uio.no Josef Noll Department of Technology Systems University of Oslo Oslo, Norway Josef.Noll@its.uio.no Abstract—The digital society has become ubiquitous, so are the concerns about trust and societal security. However, despite their apparent link, studies on these phenomena remain fragmented. Consequently, the dilemma is that we have limited knowledge of how digitalisation affects trust and societal security and how to ensure these in digital societies. We address it by proposing an interdisciplinary approach that contributes to the body of knowledge by building on the socio-technical systems perspective to integrate the three concepts: societal security, trust and digital societies, to further develop a coherent framework to understand and explain their relationship. We conclude by reiterating our theoretical contribution and implications for policy and practice and future research. Keywords— digital transformation, digital societies, societal security, socio-technical perspective, trust, system I. INTRODUCTION Societal security and trust in digital societies have become a topical issue. Moreso, when the digital transformation of society is perceived to be a desirable goal and catalyst for achieving social development goals (SDGs) [1] and, in theory, enhances trust and societal security. However, the paradox is that digital transformation can be virtuous, making the world a better place and vicious if we do not reflect on its unintended consequences. Evidence shows that digitalisation has transformed some societies, such as the Nordic and Baltic countries into inclusive and trustworthy digital societies [2-4]. On the other hand, it has also increased their vulnerability, raising concerns about trust and societal security. Since digitalisation has become an ubiquitous phenomenon, albeit, in different ways in different societies, these concerns equally apply. Broadly, societal security as a concept refers to the ability of a society or a group of people with a common identity to remain resilient or maintain their essential character in the face of changing conditions or threats, either perceived or actual, by anticipating and addressing them [5-7]. Similarly, trust is an essential character of society, referring to the vulnerability some members of society put themselves on the future expectation of others and organisations [8-10]. The ‘digital’ refers to all material and social aspects as well as their changes that include data, software, hardware, social practices as well as their political, economic, social and physical effects interacting to make the digital system, and inevitably society [11-14]. However, despite the apparent connection between societal security, trust and digital societies, the link between them remains unexplored. Consequently, we have limited knowledge on how digitalisation affects trust and societal security and the means to ensure trust and societal security in digital societies? We address this gap by taking an interdisciplinary approach, building on the most recent synthesis of the socio-technical systems perspective in science and technology studies (STS) [15]. Its underlying logic is that society shapes technology, and technology also shapes society. We integrate it with other perspectives from natural, engineering and social sciences, such as cyber-security studies [16], digital sociology [12] and system theory [17, 18]. We make a theoretical contribution by bringing together the three concepts of societal security, trust, and digital societies and explaining how they affect each other. We structure the paper using this outline: Section II elaborates on the socio-technical system perspective as an organizing concept for digital systems and society. In section III and IV, we develop a conceptual understanding of societal security and trust. Section V synthesises the three concepts: societal security, trust, and digital societies to understand and explain how they relate to each other. We conclude in Section VI by reiterating our contribution and its implications for theory, policy and practice. II. A SOCIO-TECHNICAL SYSTEM PERSPECTIVE OF DIGITAL SYSTEMS AND SOCIETIES A social-technical systems perspective is essentially an organizing concept to understand the interaction between technical and social artefacts and arrangements and their environment as open systems [15]. The overall argument is that there is a reciprocal interrelationship between humans and machines. The nature of their interaction creates the conditions for successful (or unsuccessful) system performance if not balanced [19]. In other words, a socio- technical system is a complex adaptive system or complex systems of systems with interconnected and interdependent subsystems [17, 18]. A plurality of processes or interactions 2021 14th CMI International Conference - Critical ICT Infrastructures and Platforms (CMI) | 978-1-6654-1645-0/21/$31.00 ©2021 IEEE | DOI: 10.1109/CMI53512.2021.9663764 Authorized licensed use limited to: Stavanger University Library. 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