{"resolved":true,"match_type":"uuid","source_type":"original_book","book_id":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","title":"Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age The Spirit of Networks","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9781349379743","requested_by":"printed_page","book":{"source_type":"original_book","book_id":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","id":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","uuid":"8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","title":"Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age The Spirit of Networks","normalized_title":"mediaandnewcapitalisminthedigitalagethespiritofnetworks","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9781349379743","isbns":["9781349379743","9780230106062"],"parsed":true,"ai_readable":true,"document_type":"book","page_count":258,"navigation_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","title_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/title/Media%20and%20New%20Capitalism%20in%20the%20Digital%20Age%20The%20Spirit%20of%20Networks","fixed_page_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/page/{printed_page}","path_api_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/book/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/page/{printed_page}","read_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/read/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a","page_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/page","search_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/8a3d8546-8fbb-485e-b423-37bc08c3284a/search"},"page":{"printed_page":5,"pdf_page":13,"physical_index":13,"physical_index_base":0,"printed_page_status":"recognized","page_sha256":"eb28c1771a016203a3bc50918a27e24c51513909ebe3594294c09846368c4313"},"chapter":"Media and New Capitalism in the Digital Age","content":"The book offers not only a theoretical framework to account for the new spirit of networks but also a detailed empirical account of one of the most crystallized voices of the digital discourse—Wired magazine. Chapter 2 discusses the centrality of the digital discourse in contemporary public discourse and establishes the centrality of Wired in the emerging digital discourse in contemporary political culture and, hence, its adequacy as a case study of the digital discourse.\n\nFour Loci of Network Capitalism\n\nThe digital discourse is crystallized around four key transformative sites at the intersection of network technology and the new, post-Fordist capitalism: the market, the world of work, production, and the conception of humans. The analysis of these sites is presented in Part II of the book. Chapter 3 examines the discourse at the intersection of network technology and the market. According to the digital discourse, as markets are integrated into network technology they become more frictionless and rational, demand almost no external political regulation, become more chaotic and unstable, and, in turn, require nodes—both individuals and companies—to be flexible and adaptive to an ever-changing environment. These narratives describing a network market are understood to be an ideological articulation of the transformation from the embedded liberalism of the Fordist era to the neoliberalism of the post-Fordist era. Within a technologistic framework, this discourse legitimates the trend whereby markets become more autonomous and disembedded from social regulation and are seen as an ideal mechanism for the administration of social reproduction.\n\nThrough a comparison of the digital discourse (centered on technological arguments) and the explicit neoliberal discourse (centered on economic arguments), Chapter 3 deconstructs the ideological foundations of the notion of network markets in the digital discourse. In the digital discourse, the notion of networks is rooted and constructed within the paradigm of markets—that is, as a template to understand not only economic markets but also society as a market. Set within the theoretical framework of this book, this chapter argues that the discourse on network markets legitimizes and depoliticizes the withdrawal of the Keynesian welfare state and the emergence of a new regime of neoliberalism. The chapter also serves as a general introduction to the key words that dominate the digital discourse as a whole, such as network rationality, spontaneous order, chaos, decentralization, and dehierarchization.\n\nMarkets are not the only systems transformed by network technology: the whole system of production changes as well. The analysis of the digital discourse on these transformations is presented in the next two chapters. Chapter 4 examines the digital discourse at the intersection of network technology and the world of work. According to the digital discourse, as the traditional world of work is integrated into network technology, the boundaries between work life and personal life become indistinguishable; work space and work time are intermingled with their private, personal counterparts. These novelties allow workers to bring their personal, lifeworld qualities of creativity, intimate relationships, and deep personal engagement to bear on their work activities and reeroticize the disenchanted world of (industrial) work. They also render the workplace flat—that is, decentralized and dehierarchized—and eradicate hierarchies between workers and managers and owners. What results is a regime of meritocracy and professionalism based on one’s proficiency with network technology. These narratives of network work signal a radical break from the narratives of work alienation in the bureaucratized organization. Network technology is situated at the pivotal axis of rendering work—the work process, work relations, and the workplace—more humane and more liberating for the worker.\n\nTechnology Discourse and Capitalist Legitimation\n\n5","previous_page":4,"next_page":6}