Beller, J. (2022). Digitality and racial capitalism. In B. Skeggs, S. R. Farris, A. Toscano, S. Bromberg (Eds.) The Sage Handbook of Marxism. SAGE Publications Ltd,

In this episode, we explore the chilling intersection of technology and systemic oppression through Jonathan Beller's "Digitality and Racial Capitalism," featured in the Sage Handbook of Marxism. Beller proposes that capitalism has always functioned as a "world computer," a brutal process of encrypting the world’s myriad qualities into quantifiable data for profit. We examine the concept of "real abstraction," arguing that information is not a natural occurrence but a social product derived from the history of commodity exchange and racialization. The discussion reveals how race functions as an "executable code" inscribed on bodies to automate "algorithms of extractive violence" and predetermine the unequal distribution of global resources. We further analyze how modern digitality and informatics serve as a "racial contract," masking white supremacy under the guise of neutral, content-indifferent algorithms. Ultimately, the episode considers what it means to "reprogram" our economic and cultural logics to decolonize computation and reclaim the "fugitive legacies of creativity, community, and care" from the relentless calculus of racial capital.

#RacialCapitalism #Digitality #Marxism #JonathanBeller #AlgorithmsOfOppression #RealAbstraction #Informatics #SocialJustice #DecolonizeTech #PoliticalEconomy