Software, Sovereignty and the Post-Neoliberal Politics of Exit

Roger Burrows,Harrison Smith

doi:10.1177/0263276421999439

Roger Burrows, Harrison Smith

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1177/0263276421999439

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Abstract

This paper examines the impact of neoreactionary (NRx) thinking – that of Curtis Yarvin, Nick Land, Peter Thiel and Patri Friedman in particular – on contemporary political debates manifest in ‘architectures of exit’. We specifically focus on Urbit, as an NRx digital architecture that captures how post-neoliberal politics imagines notions of freedom and sovereignty through a micro-fracturing of nation-states into ‘gov-corps’. We trace the development of NRx philosophy – and situate this within contemporary political and technological change to theorize the significance of exit manifest within the notion of ‘dynamic geographies’. While technological programmes such as Urbit may never ultimately succeed, we argue that these, and other speculative investments such as ‘seasteading’, reflect broader post-neoliberal NRx imaginaries that were, perhaps, prefigured a quarter of a century ago in The Sovereign Individual.

Highlights

It would be impossible to countenance any discussion of the concept of post-neoliberalism without considering the mediating influence of the depressing melange of discourses that – especially post-2008 – have come to be summarized under the moniker of the alt-right
Within the context of broader discussions about post-neoliberalism, we see a critical discussion of Urbit as contributing to several overlapping debates concerning the future cultural politics of software and cloud-computing for: epistemological transformations invoked by artificial intelligence (Parisi, 2019; Amoore, 2019); the use of decentralized technologies, such as blockchain, for governance and self-determination (Atzori, 2017; Campbell-Verduyn, 2018); and, crucially, sovereignty (Bratton, 2016; Amoore, 2020)
As we have already noted, writing almost a quarter of a century ago, James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg published The Sovereign Individual, a book that Thiel claims to have heavily influenced his worldview (O’Connell, 2018). They predict the eventual collapse of the nation-state and the eclipse of politics by corporatist initiatives

Summary

Introduction

Within the context of broader discussions about post-neoliberalism, we see a critical discussion of Urbit as contributing to several overlapping debates concerning the future cultural politics of software and cloud-computing for: epistemological transformations invoked by artificial intelligence (Parisi, 2019; Amoore, 2019); the use of decentralized technologies, such as blockchain, for governance and self-determination (Atzori, 2017; Campbell-Verduyn, 2018); and, crucially, sovereignty (Bratton, 2016; Amoore, 2020) Hitherto, these literatures have had little engagement with the radical politics of what we will term redecentralization, or the underlying post-neoliberal – and primarily libertarian – theories of exit that have become inscribed into a wider ideology of data power thought capable of enacting new forms of jurisdictional sovereignty.

A Strange Brew

Conclusions

One is immediately reminded of Micronations