Conclusion

Abstract

The political economy of search illustrates deeply transnationalized global capitalism that is interlinked to and interwoven with the internet. For the global power states, the question is not about building a global democratic information system; rather to what extent will the US, China and EU pursue their own interests without disrupting vital markets and destabilizing the shared project of the global capitalist system? Thus, merely altering corporate behavior to be more “competitive” or more “moral,” as if there is a world of a perfect competitive market, is not sufficient. If the history of search offers a lesson, the commodification of our basic search activities wasn’t imperative or a natural progression. It tells us that it can be de-commodified and reorganized as a global public utility. The book concludes that, if capital and capitalist states were mobilized to reorganize our basic social and information provision into markets, then the force of collective opposition lies with labor.