Power corrupts, warns Julian Assange

2014-05-21 14:23

Cape Town - The centralisation of power represents a major threat to democratic institutions, says Julian Assange, the publisher of whistleblower website WikiLeaks.

"We can see on the one hand a tendency toward totalising and centralisation that is represented by what is happening at the National Security Agency and by organisations - whether they like it or not, and sometimes it appears they do - that have to feed in to the National Security Agency such as Google," said Assange from the Ecuadorian embassy in London.

He was speaking at the Net Prophet event in Cape Town that seeks to "inspire creativity and the flow of ideas among entrepreneurs and stakeholders who operate in the internet-tech space in Africa and South Africa".

As the publisher of WikiLeaks, he is wanted by the US FBI on charges related to the release of confidential documents on the war in Iraq.

"That centralisation of information and centralisation of power is a pretty concerning thing," said Assange.

Sensitive communications

He compared the flow of information on the internet to roads in ancient times.

"We look back to historical analogues such as the Roman roads. When you connect together different parts of the world and different parts of the economy, what happens? Well, it means that power can flow across the connections.

"We can become sucked up into whatever the dominant power centre is," Assange added.

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Power corrupts, warns Julian Assange