That's a good read, thank you for sharing. I do not believe that a lack of privacy and surveillance are a given. You can have a strong Democratic state with surveillance, if you have strong privacy guarantees and the means to enforce them. I'll point to the, for the time, rapidly expanding surveillance state of revolutionary America in the 1770s and 1780s for that, but I admit, this is a much larger discussion, but your article and point are well taken.
Edit: Update based on additional thoughts and comments below. This reply is to the perspectives and argument offered by /u/euxotic and my response is: "Circling around to say I thought about this over the last four days. In brief, my perspective that you can have a surveillance apparatus and a contemporary democracy in the 21st century were misguided. You are right."