Western states must operate through surveillance capitalist firms to access instrumentarian power

Evidence

The difference between surveillance capitalism in the West and China’s emerging social credit system pivots on the patterns of entanglement and engagement between instrumentarian and state power. There are structural differences. In the West, as we have seen, the patterns have taken on many forms. The state began as bosom and shelter, then eager student and envious cousin. Surveillance capitalism and its instruments have come of age now, producing a fitful but necessary partnership. Key instrumentarian capabilities are docked in the big surveillance capitalist firms, and the state must move with and through these firms to access much of the power it seeks. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1255

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to prior chapters’ account of state-firm entanglement and anticipates the Chinese contrast detailed in the next paragraph. — connects to: The state cannot command instrumentarian power but must work through surveillance capitalists — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1230; The state increasingly depends on private instrumentarian power for its security aims — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1226

Broader Connections

• The state cannot command instrumentarian power but must work through surveillance capitalists #corroborates (0.98) — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1230