Unchecked market economies generate divergence that threatens democratic societies.
Evidence
Should we grow weary of our own struggle for self-determination and surrender instead to the seductions of Big Other, we will inadvertently trade a future of homecoming for an arid prospect of muted, sanitized tyranny. A third modernity that solves our problems at the price of a human future is a cruel perversion of capitalism and of the digital capabilities it commands. It is also an unacceptable affront to democracy. I repeat Thomas Piketty’s warning: “A market economy… if left to itself… contains powerful forces of divergence, which are potentially threatening to democratic societies and to the values of social justice on which they are based.” This is precisely the whirlwind that we will reap at the hands of surveillance capitalism, an unprecedented form of raw capitalism that is surely contributing to the tempering of commitment to the democratic prospect as it successfully bends populations to its soft-spoken will. It gives so much, but it takes even more. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1642
Categorization
- XREF: Piketty quote connects to the reader’s existing thinking on economic divergence from the Milgrom trade-institutions and market-economy readings. — connects to: GDP growth masks extreme wealth concentration and environmental destruction. — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 93; Unchecked market forces produce wealth divergence threatening democracy — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 136; Neoliberal deregulation erodes democracy as politics abdicates to market pressure — Jürgen Habermas, A New Structural Transformation of the…, 81 (+2 more)
- SEED: The line ‘It gives so much, but it takes even more’ could anchor an essay on how convenience economies exact hidden costs that compound democratic erosion.
Broader Connections
- Unchecked market forces produce wealth divergence threatening democracy
#corroborates(1.00) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 136 - Neoliberal deregulation erodes democracy as politics abdicates to market pressure
#corroborates(0.90) — Jürgen Habermas, A New Structural Transformation of the…, 81 - Formal political equality masks deep economic servitude that hollows out democracy
#expands(0.85) — Clara E. Mattei, Escape from Capitalism, 406 - Neoliberalism reframed democracy and unions as enemies of market truth.
#expands(0.80) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 123