Seeing Like a Platform: An Inquiry into the Condition of Digital Modernity

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Petter Törnberg (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands) Justus Uitermark (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)

Seeing Like a Platform

An Inquiry into the Condition of Digital Modernity

Petter Törnberg (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands), Justus Uitermark (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)

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English

Routledge
29 January 2025

Social theory; Ethical & social aspects of computing; Legal aspects of computing; Algorithms & data structures; Computer science

Series: Complexity in Social Science

Power needs abstraction, to make the unwieldy complexity of the social world legible and manageable. The proposition at the heart of Seeing Like a Platform is that digital technology brings new metaphors through which power operates. While industrial modernity saw society as a machinery to be designed according to detailed blueprints, digital modernity views society as organic and alive, to be herded and nudged through digital infrastructures, AI, and algorithms.

Seeing Like a Platform explores the history, meaning, and far-reaching consequences of this epistemological shift. From social movements to Wikipedia, from digital platforms to city planning, from social science to media, society is being redefined by ideas from complexity science. While complexity offers a vision of a self-organized society freed from hierarchies and overbearing bureaucracies, it simultaneously enables new forms of domination and control.

Through theoretical reflections and case studies, Seeing Like a Platform offers an inquiry into digital modernity. Accessibly written and broad ranging, it is an essential reading for scholars, students, and practitioners in fields such as sociology, political science, urban studies, and technology studies. It will also interest anyone keen to understand the profound impact of digital technologies on governance, social organization, and everyday life.

The Open Access version of this book, available at http://www.taylorfrancis.com, has been made available under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license.

By: Petter Törnberg (University of Amsterdam Netherlands), Justus Uitermark (University of Amsterdam, Netherlands)
Imprint: Routledge
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 234mm, Width: 156mm,
Weight: 303g
ISBN: 9781032354330
ISBN 10: 103235433X
Series: Complexity in Social Science
Pages: 154
Publication Date: 29 January 2025
Audience: General/trade , College/higher education , ELT Advanced , Primary
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

1. Introduction 2. The social science of complexity 3. Complex cities: Longing for Wikitopia 4. Complex bureaucracies: Self-organization in Wikipedia 5. Complex media: The epistemology of digital capitalism 6. Complex contention: Anonymous’ power dynamics 7. Digital Platforms: Complexity and power in the digital economy 8. Conclusion: The biopolitics of Artificial Intelligence

Petter Törnberg is Assistant Professor in Computational Social Science at the University of Amsterdam. He studies the intersection of AI, social media, and politics using computational methods and digital data for critical inquiry. His most recent book is Intimate Communities of Hate: Why Social Media Fuels Far-Right Extremism (with Anton Törnberg). Justus Uitermark is a geographer and sociologist at the University of Amsterdam. He holds a chair in Urban Geography and directs the Amsterdam Institute for Social Science Research. Uitermark has written widely on cities, social movements, and digital platforms. His books include On Display: Instagram, the Self, and the City (with John Boy), Cities and Social Movements (with Walter Nicholls), and Dynamics of Power in Dutch Integration Politics.