How Silicon Valley Unleashed Techno-feudalism: The Making of the Digital Economy

Inequality, stagnant productivity, endemic instability… The new economy has not arrived. Algorithms are ubiquitous, but this does not mean that capitalism has become civilized. On the contrary.

Instead, as a result of the digitalization of the world, a great regression has occurred. The return of monopolies, the dependence of subjects on platforms, the blurring of the distinction between the economic and the political: the mutations at work are transforming the quality of social processes and giving a new relevance to feudalism.

Techno-feudalism reconfigures a history if the Silicon Valley consensus and highlights the five paradoxes that undermine it. The central thesis is then unfolded, punctuated by developments on GAFAs, global value chains or the Chinese social credit system. Large firms compete in cyberspace to gain control over data sources. Subjects are attached to the digital glebe. In the emerging economic order, capital is moving away from production to focus on predation.

Format: Hardback
Pages: 240
Imprint: Verso
Publication date: 03/12/2024