Discrimination In The Age Of Algorithms / Jon Kleinberg, Jens Ludwig, Sendhil Mullainathan, Cass R. Sunstein.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kleinberg, Jon.

Contributor:

National Bureau of Economic Research.

Ludwig, Jens.

Mullainathan, Sendhil.

Sunstein, Cass R.

Series:

Working Paper Series (National Bureau of Economic Research) no. w25548.

NBER working paper series no. w25548

Language:

English

Physical Description:

1 online resource: illustrations (black and white);

Place of Publication:

Cambridge, Mass. National Bureau of Economic Research 2019.

Summary:

The law forbids discrimination. But the ambiguity of human decision-making often makes it extraordinarily hard for the legal system to know whether anyone has actually discriminated. To understand how algorithms affect discrimination, we must therefore also understand how they affect the problem of detecting discrimination. By one measure, algorithms are fundamentally opaque, not just cognitively but even mathematically. Yet for the task of proving discrimination, processes involving algorithms can provide crucial forms of transparency that are otherwise unavailable. These benefits do not happen automatically. But with appropriate requirements in place, the use of algorithms will make it possible to more easily examine and interrogate the entire decision process, thereby making it far easier to know whether discrimination has occurred. By forcing a new level of specificity, the use of algorithms also highlights, and makes transparent, central tradeoffs among competing values. Algorithms are not only a threat to be regulated; with the right safeguards in place, they have the potential to be a positive force for equity.

Notes:

Print version record

February 2019.