A new form of capital is ascending: cloud capital—networked algorithmic machines that grant their owners remarkable powers to modify our behaviour. And just as financiers needed neoliberalism, today’s tech lords need a new ideology to legitimise their rule. I call it techlordism.
Sure, but let’s call it what it is: fascism. We need to stop inventing fancy names for things that have existed for a century.
There is a difference, but largely in the industry whose capital backs this new fascism. In the 1920s and ‘30s, the dominant / ascendant form of capital was manufacturing capital, so those were the biggest backers of German fascism (both in Germany and the US). In our time in the US, the ascendant capital is big tech, but most of their assets are in cloud computing. This will inform the face it puts forward, so it does change the modes and styles of its propaganda, but you best believe the same fascist goals are at the heart of it all. So I say: call it fascism.