Contemporary power struggles now turn on engineered behavior modification, not class relations

Evidence

Most pointedly, Facebook’s declaration of experimental authority claims surveillance capitalists’ prerogatives over the future course of others’ behavior. In declaring the right to modify human action secretly and for profit, surveillance capitalism effectively exiles us from our own behavior, shifting the locus of control over the future tense from “I will” to “You will.” Each one of us may follow a distinct path, but economies of action ensure that the path is already shaped by surveillance capitalism’s economic imperatives. The struggle for power and control in society is no longer associated with the hidden facts of class and its relationship to production but rather by the hidden facts of automated engineered behavior modification. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 969

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The claim that the axis of social power has shifted from hidden class relations to hidden engineered behavior modification is a paradigm-level reframing that restructures how one reads political economy
• XREF: The ‘I will’ to ‘You will’ shift echoes the law-merchant and trust material on how social control migrates from personal agency to institutional/environmental shaping — connects to: Behavioral modification requires asymmetries of knowledge and power — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 874; Mass behavior modification was denounced decades ago but now passes with little resistance — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 70; Behavioral engineering once reviled is now openly embraced by tech leadership — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1266 (+8 more)
• QUESTION: Is Zuboff right that class-based power analysis is obsolete, or does behavior modification simply become the new terrain on which class power operates?
• ADDENDUM: Directly extends the ‘On Sacrifice’ theme of social structures shaping individual volition, now via automated means rather than ritual

Broader Connections

• Instrumentarian power governs through inducement and reinforcement rather than overt coercion #expands (0.90) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1629
• Behavioral engineering once reviled is now openly embraced by tech leadership #corroborates (0.85) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1266
• Mass behavior modification was denounced decades ago but now passes with little resistance #corroborates (0.80) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 70
• Modern power gained force by moving from brute architecture to the subject’s own perception #expands (0.80) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 315
• Disciplinary power produces individuals rather than suppressing them. #expands (0.80) — Michel Foucault, Discipline & Punish- The Birth of the…, 264
• Coercive behavior modification on prisoners constitutes a form of state power over mind #exemplifies (0.80) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1017
• Behavioral modification requires asymmetries of knowledge and power #expands (0.78) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 874
• Dominant powers benefit from engineering their subjects’ inability to trust #exemplifies (0.78)
• Power produces subjects and desires rather than merely repressing them #expands (0.75) — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 131
• Structural social problems arise from non-politicized power, not overthrow of rulers #corroborates (0.75) — Niklas Luhmann, Trust and Power, 769