KTub8

Digital Solidarity
collectivity is a way to advance the wider social context
that provides resources for, and gives meaning to, the
pursuit of one’s singular goals. Thus, there is a calculus
in sharing, but it’s not one of individual maximisation
at the expense of others. Sharing, as a value, expresses
the transformation of the relationship between persons
and collectives. As a method, it reduces transaction
costs in a context where productive capacity is highly
distributed and flexibly linked into projects that come
together and dissolve easily. 77 Thus, it is a way to resolve
the tension identified at the beginning of this essay, the
tension between the social character of production and
the private character of appropriation by putting the
social character of production at the centre and private
appropriation to the periphery of the system.
So What?
The phenomena described here are marginal, even if
they can mobilise swarms of hundreds of thousands
of people. Even the rise of weak networks as the new
normal of social communication is still relatively shallow
and superficial, compared to the deep institutions that
continue to exert an overwhelming influence over
our societies. The new institutions that I have tried to
describe are very much in their infancy. They are still
carried by relatively small segments of the population,
mainly globalised young people. So is this all wishful
just thinking? The result of particular filter bubble that
makes it hard to keep all the things that are suddenly
visible in proportion to all the things that have been
rendered invisible?
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