If there are indeed rights we feel can be guaranteed by technology, then we don't even have to explore the legal, simply because the legal would be much easier to compromise, technology much harder (or even impossible). The guarantee of this being laws of physics.
It's time we moved from these institutions from which we have derived utility of questionable value. No doubt these institutions will resist change, and they are, but the proof that this struggle is a futile one is the internet.
Knowledge castes have indeed grown, and thrived, and they will. It's becoming easier for like minded people to self-organize. Big tech and govts have been unable to suppress or even control the free flow of information.
And with the exponential growth in technology, this task becomes increasingly difficult. One could argue the exponential growth provides both with tools, but these tools will necessarily be insufficient; it's unlikely they could rival distributed processing.
So why not encode the rules of these knowledge castes in decentralized autonomous organizations?
This is the next step in the evolution of social organization. Of course I could be wrong, but my point is not being right. I'm simply pointing out the direction in which humanity could obtain optimal progress.