Capitalism &amp; Democracy in the Digital Age: Examining How the USA &amp; Germany Enable &amp; Disempower Surveillance Capitalism &amp; Google

This thesis sets itself within this broader theoretical debate of discussing the relationship between capitalism and democracy. It investigates how capitalism has been able to gain unrivaled power within the global political economy, particularly over democracy, through further developing the separation between what is determined as the 'political' and the 'economic'. Furthermore, it concentrates on the implications of the significant structural changes caused by capitalism and its role in shaping the digitalization of our societies. In the process, the paper analyzes Shoshanna Zuboff's understanding of surveillance capitalism because it is the needed contemporary analytical assessment of how big tech and its surveillance operations produce various adverse outcomes in the global political economy. It primarily focuses on how surveillance capitalists utilize the ideology and mechanisms of capitalism while undermining democracy and increasing epistemological and material inequalities....Show moreThis thesis sets itself within this broader theoretical debate of discussing the relationship between capitalism and democracy. It investigates how capitalism has been able to gain unrivaled power within the global political economy, particularly over democracy, through further developing the separation between what is determined as the 'political' and the 'economic'. Furthermore, it concentrates on the implications of the significant structural changes caused by capitalism and its role in shaping the digitalization of our societies. In the process, the paper analyzes Shoshanna Zuboff's understanding of surveillance capitalism because it is the needed contemporary analytical assessment of how big tech and its surveillance operations produce various adverse outcomes in the global political economy. It primarily focuses on how surveillance capitalists utilize the ideology and mechanisms of capitalism while undermining democracy and increasing epistemological and material inequalities. In its many forms, surveillance capitalism undermines democracy and human rights and creates unequal power structures within our societies. These adverse developments are possible because of the specific historical conditions that allowed surveillance capitalism to thrive and become normative behavior. Existing political and economic structures enabled surveillance capitalists like Google, Facebook, and Amazon to become dominant hegemonic forces in the global political economy. These corporations undemocratically extract data from individuals' lives by coercing users to accept their terms and conditions, which can take days to fully understand the implications on their human rights, privacy, and freedoms (Zuboff, 2019). Surveillance capitalists then capitalize on their data by selling it for profit, using it to improve their services, or utilizing it to predict and manipulate future behavior in collaboration with other market actors (Zuboff, 2019). This represents the commodification of human behavior, personal information and digital social interactions. How actors like Google have been able to extract, commodify (or profit from) and manipulate individuals' behavior has severe implications for the individual human rights and foundational principles and values of democracy. All of this depicts a pattern of subordinating human behavior to the logic of capitalist markets for profit while putting at risk the freedom, autonomy, and self-determination of citizens in the market, politics, and everyday life. Democratic countries have enabled and undermined Google and other corporations that create unequal power structures and succeed in exploiting citizens. This thesis identifies and analyses how the United States and Germany have attempted to address Google's intrusive big data operations. Particularly, it focuses on how they have both undermined and protected democracy by addressing surveillance capitalism and its adverse outcomes.Show less

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Capitalism & Democracy in the Digital Age: Examining How the USA & Germany Enable & Disempower Surveillance Capitalism & Google