Thus, that the nodes comprising the network—be it computer chips, workers in a company, companies in the economy, or individuals in the marketplace—are dumb, unreflexive, and short sighted relative to the network as a whole is a cornerstone of both the digital and neoliberal worldviews. In the digital discourse, it is premised on a techno-scientific discovery of the operation of nodes in information networks. In neoliberalism, it is premised on the socioscientific assumption regarding the limited capacity of individuals: individuals are “partially and perpetually ignorant” about markets (Sally 1998, 19). The crucial difference between the digital discourse and neoliberal theory is the depth in which the foundations on their respective arguments lie: while in neoliberal thought these are anchored in abstract, theoretical constructs such as “the market,” or “constitutional ignorance” (i.e., in knowledge), in the digital discourse these arguments are welded into the “materiality” of network technology, such as dumb chips and network architecture (i.e., in practice or reality).
Both in the digital discourse and neoliberal theory, the constitution of the individual as the central and sole unit of social operation is paramount. Both place premiums on the independence of each node in the network (or liberty of each individual in the market). But there is also an interesting variance between them, a variance that might be conceived in terms of an “evolution” in the analysis of the interrelation between individual liberty and spontaneous order from classical liberalism, through neoliberalism, and finally to the digital discourse. In the classical liberalism of Adam Smith, John Stuart Mill, and David Hume, individual liberty in the marketplace is seen as a natural, unconditional right, hence the term “natural liberty”; it is assumed to be a virtue on its own merit (Greenwald 1994; Ashford and Davies 1991, 170–73). This constitutes a normative legitimation for the free market.
In contrast to these scholars of the Scottish Enlightenment, neoliberal theory withers away with the normative and metaphysical component of “natural liberty” as a basis for liberalism. Neoliberalism turns the argument on its head, seeing individual liberty as a prerequisite for the successful operation of the market. For spontaneous order (i.e., the market) to occur, individual liberty must prevail. For Hayek, the argument for liberalism is based on a social theory rather than on a moral premise. His advocacy for individual liberty stems from the “epistemic problem” discussed previously (Petsoulas 2001, 2, 16): “Given that knowledge is dispersed, tacit and temporary, it is most efficiently utilised in an environment of decentralised decision-making in which individuals arefree to pursue their goals by using the information available to them” (16, emphasis mine). This constitutes a scientific legitimation for the free market. As
66
Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age