5 Future Directions
.........................................................................................................................................................................................
For the analysis of the meaning and normative conception of privacy, certain
insights strike me as fundamental: these include the feminist critique of the
traditional separation between private and public, and the interconnection of
privacy, freedom, and autonomy. It also seems clear that theoretical en-
deavors should not cling to the image of a realm or domain, but should
conceive of privacy rather as a multidimensional concept calling for an
interdisciplinary approach. 3
There remain a number of problems. First is the question of what privacy
can mean in a multicultural state, and how cultural diVerences—often
motivated by religion and with a special bearing upon the privacy of the
body—should be normatively treated in a conception of privacy. Such prob-
lems in turn indicate that the boundary between the private and the public
calls for constant reinterpretation, is always open to dispute, and will never be
Wxed for good.
A second question concerns the relationship between the individual and the
community at large. Especially for more conservative critiques of contempor-
ary culture, one central issue is how far restrictions on individual privacy
might prove necessary in order to protect communal practices or institutions,
and how far certain privacies might have to be limited in the interests of
‘‘privacy as an obligation.’’ The lines of conXict between such communitarian
discourse and feminist approaches based on personal liberties continue to be a
matter of dispute, not only in philosophical and normative terms but also
with respect to the juridical paradigm (Cohen 2002 ,151V).
Third, andWnally—and this I consider the central issue—a theory of
privacy cannot ultimately be elaborated without a theory of democracy.
Because the negotiation of the fragile boundary separating private freedom
from social or state control—with regard to the Internet no less than theWght
against terrorism—is what constitutes this boundary in theWrst place, the
question of how such negotiation is to be democratically legitimated and
3 This interdisciplinary approach should also include, next to the mentioned disciplines, media
studies, and cultural studies more generally; cf. Koch ( 2004 ). Quite a number ofWlms thematize the
threat to personal privacy in very interesting ways, for instance (one of theWrstWlms to do so)The
Conversation(Francis Ford Coppola 1974 ) and, famously,The Truman Show(Peter Weir 1998 ) and
Enemy of the State(Tony Scott 1998 ), to name but a few. Most of theseWlms criticize control and
surveillance from a quasi-liberal point of view; but compare, equally interesting,Arlington Road
(Mark Pellington 1999 ) which is decidedly communitarian in outlook.
708 beate roessler