Value Conflicts and Social Choice in Electronic
Funds Transfer System Developments

During the last few years, computer-based
systems which automate the transfer and recording 
of debits and credits have begun to be implemented on
a large scale.  These systems promise both financial 
benefits for the institutions that use them and potential
conveniences to their customers.  However, 
they also raise significant social, legal, and technical
questions that must be resolved if full scale 
systems for Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) are not
to cause more problems for the larger public than 
they solve.  This paper examines the incentives for EFT
developments and the social problems they raise 
in the context of conflicts between five different value
positions that are often implicit in analyses 
of proposed EFT arrangements.  These conflicts reflect
the relative importance of certain problems for 
specific groups.  The value positions implicit in EFT proposals
help to organize analyses of market arrangements, 
system reliability, and privacy of transactions.  These
topics are analyzed in this article and related 
to the value positions held by concerned parties.  Last,
the ways in which the public can learn about 
the social qualities of different EFT arrangements and
the pace of EFT developments are both discussed 
in the context of social choice. 

CACM August, 1978

Kling, R.

Electronic funds transfer systems, social impacts
of computing, privacy, social choice, computer 
networks, network reliability, security, social values

2.11 2.12 2.3 3.52 3.53 3.55

CA780802 DH February 7, 1979  2:25 PM

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