Slow legal process lets contested practices settle into ordinary acceptance

Evidence

In a second stage the aim is habituation. Whereas lawsuits and investigations unwind at the tedious pace of democratic institutions, Google continues the development of its contested practices at high velocity. During the elapsed time of FTC and FCC inquiries, court cases, judicial reviews, and EU Commission investigations, the new contested practices become more firmly established as institutional facts, rapidly bolstered by growing ecosystems of stakeholders. People habituate to the incursion with some combination of agreement, helplessness, and resignation. The sense of astonishment and outrage dissipates. The incursion itself, once unthinkable, slowly worms its way into the ordinary. Worse still, it gradually comes to seem inevitable. New dependencies develop. As populations grow numb, it becomes more difficult for individuals and groups to complain. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 440

Categorization

• XREF: Mirrors the ‘institutional facts’ literature on how contested practices become taken-for-granted once they persist — also echoes how reputational regimes stabilize in the diamond trade. — connects to: Regulatory settlements lag behind the tactical redirections they punish — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 530; Legal precepts evolve slowly as working hypotheses continually retested in courts — Ruggero J. Aldisert, Agatha D. Aldisert, Logic for Lawyers- A Guide to Clear…, 644; Repeated violations of international law gradually normalize new practices — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 534 (+6 more)
• SEED: Article angle: the ‘temporal asymmetry’ of regulation — why the slow pace of democratic institutions structurally favors the dispossessor.
• DEEPTHINKING: The claim that incursions become ‘institutional facts’ simply by persisting through the glacial pace of legal review is a dense, paradigm-level insight about how power converts elapsed time into legitimacy.

Broader Connections

• Repeated violations of international law gradually normalize new practices #exemplifies (0.85) — Grégoire Chamayou, A Theory of the Drone, 534
• Legal precepts evolve slowly as working hypotheses continually retested in courts #corroborates (0.75) — Ruggero J. Aldisert, Agatha D. Aldisert, Logic for Lawyers- A Guide to Clear…, 644