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2 - The Corporate Reconfiguration of the Social World

from Part I - Living in a Datafied World

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 September 2020

By
Nick Couldry
Edited by
Matthew Powers  and
Adrienne Russell
Matthew Powers
Affiliation:
University of Washington
Adrienne Russell
Affiliation:
University of Washington
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Summary

This chapter introduces the concept of data colonialism. Nick Couldry argues that capitalism has developed a new mode of colonialism, in which the appropriated resources are not land, land resources or bodies, but life itself, which is appropriated for value through the extraction of data traces, often via social media platforms. This new data colonialism, Couldry argues, paves the way for changes in capitalism whose full shape we cannot know yet, but which will be built around not just labor relations data relations that appear in and through media and public life. Such data relations produce value by imposing categorizations, that is, alternative modes of knowledge about the social world. Beyond introducing this concept, Couldry also hypothesizes a worrisome result: A hollowing out of previous ways of knowing the social world, with potential profound implications for the politics of social justice.

Keywords

data colonialismpolitical economy of digital mediabig datacapitalismsocial theory
Type
Chapter
Information
Rethinking Media Research for Changing Societies , pp. 27 - 38
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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