Control by feedback has replaced centralized external power in late capitalism

Evidence

TV’s Big Brother had superseded Orwell’s Big Brother. We the audience are not subjected to a power that comes from outside; rather, we are integrated into a control circuit that has our desires and preferences as its only mandate – but those desires and preferences are returned to us, no longer as ours, but as the desires of the big Other. Clearly, these circuits are not confined to television: cybernetic feedback systems (focus groups, demographic surveys) are now integral to the delivery of all ‘services’, including education and government. — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 99

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s work on the disappearance of the big Other vs. its persistence (Section 2 headings: ‘the demise of the big Other has been exaggerated’ / ‘has the big Other gone the way of small gods’). Also resonates with surveillance capitalism literature on feedback loops. — connects to: Control society replaces discipline with entrepreneurial self-direction — Byung-Chul Han, Psychopolitics: Neoliberalism and New…, 51; Control societies govern by indefinite postponement and internalized policing — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No…, 48; Financialized capitalism shapes human activity and escapes human control — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 340
• DEFINE: Defines the cybernetic feedback mode of control that supersedes centralized authority.

Related

• Reality television feedback replaced external surveillance with self-integrated control (similarity 0.87)

Broader Connections

• Financialized capitalism shapes human activity and escapes human control #expands (0.80) — Max Haiven, Cultures of Financialization, 340