Algorithms and the End of Politics : How Technology Shapes 21st-Century American Life

As the United States contends with issues of populism and de-democratization, this book considers the impacts of digital technologies on the country's politics and society. The book provides a Marxist analysis of the rise of digital media, social networks and technology giants like Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. It looks at the impact of these new platforms and technologies on their users who have made them among the most valuable firms in the world. The book is concerned with unfreedom and class rule in contemporary American capitalism as seen in the digital realm. Class struggle is the first and last force shaping developments in communication. The book looks at the response of the ruling class to an organic crisis in the United States, and it traces how digital media instruments are used by different factions within the capitalist ruling class to capture and maintain the commanding heights of the American social structure. The book moves on to examine the role of data and whiteness in American social life. It traces the evolving intersection of capital, security and technology to examine the broad trajectory of unfreedom. The book concludes that digital society requires significant restructuring if it is to facilitate greater democratization. Offering bold, new thinking across data politics and digital and economic sociology, this is a powerful demonstration of how algorithms have come to shape everyday life and political legitimacy in the United States and beyond. Front Cover Algorithms and the End of Politics: How Technology Shapes 21st- Century American Life Copyright information Dedication Table of contents Acknowledgments Introduction: The Great Simplification Computation and the social question The limits of progressive neoliberal social theory Communication and the end of neoliberal politics A material consolidation Summary and outlook 1 Algorithms and the Critical Theory of Technology Data, politics and rights The code of capital Code as material governance Computational reason Liberation is not opaque 2 The One- Dimensionality of Data Acemoglu and Robinson’s econometrics The politics of quantities Reification, mystification and alienation The spector of positivism A depoliticization of the social question 3 Reactionary Tendencies in the Ruling Class Finance and class struggle Downplaying class differentiation Information robber barons Infrastructures for reactionary politics Ruling class solidarity 4 Platforms of Power Staving off class struggle ‘from below’ Democratic socialism was the compromise The retreat from basic descriptions Courting disaster Institutionalizing hierarchy 5 The Whiteness of Communication Studies The conception of progress Race in America Misrecognition and modernity Capitalism’s extra- economic dimensions 6 Misinformation and Ideology Popular rhetorics of misinformation Ideology and politics Reactionary racial agendas Externalization 7 Testbeds for Authoritarianism The reconceptualization of war Experimentation on new frontiers Blended information warfare Technology as the so- called solution to the social question Conclusion: The Fatal Abstractions of Capitalist Rule Mystification, rationalization, externalization References Index Back Cover EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence. As the US contends with issues of populism and de-democratization, this timely study considers the impacts of digital technologies on the country’s politics and society. Timcke provides a Marxist analysis of the rise of digital media, social networks and technology giants like Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. He looks at the impact of these new platforms and technologies on their users who have made them among the most valuable firms in the world. Offering bold new thinking across data politics and digital and economic sociology, this is a powerful demonstration of how algorithms have come to shape everyday life and political legitimacy in the US and beyond.EPDF and EPUB available Open Access under CC-BY-NC-ND licence. As the US contends with issues of populism and de-democratization, this timely study considers the impacts of digital technologies on the country’s politics and society. Timcke provides a Marxist analysis of the rise of digital media, social networks and technology giants like Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. He looks at the impact of these new platforms and technologies on their users who have made them among the most valuable firms in the world. Offering bold new thinking across data politics and digital and economic sociology, this is a powerful demonstration of how algorithms have come to shape everyday life and political legitimacy in the US and beyond "As the US contends with issues of populism and de-democratization, this timely study considers the impacts of digital technologies on the country's politics and society. Timcke provides a Marxist analysis of the rise of digital media, social networks and technology giants like Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. He looks at the impact of these new platforms and technologies on their users who have made them among the most valuable firms in the world. Offering bold new thinking across data politics and digital and economic sociology, this is a powerful demonstration of how algorithms have come to shape everyday life and political legitimacy in the United States and beyond"--Page 4 de la couverture. "As the US contends with issues of populism and de-democratization, this timely study considers the impacts of digital technologies on the country's politics and society. Timcke provides a Marxist analysis of the rise of digital media, social networks and technology giants like Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft. He looks at the impact of these new platforms and technologies on their users who have made them among the most valuable firms in the world. Offering bold new thinking across data politics and digital and economic sociology, this is a powerful demonstration of how algorithms have come to shape everyday life and political legitimacy in the US and beyond"-- Provided by publisher This Book Is A Timely Analysis Of The Growing Impact Of Digital Technologies On Populism In The Us And Beyond. Scott Timcke Uses Marxist Analysis To Explore The Way Digital Devices, Social Networks, Data And Algorithms, And The Technology Giants That Lie Behind Them, Are Changing The Way People Think About Politics And Society.