Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/313639 
Authors: 
Year of Publication: 
2025
Series/Report no.: 
ZNWU Discussion Paper No. 14
Publisher: 
Hochschule Darmstadt, Fachbereich Wirtschaft, Zentrum für Nachhaltige Wirtschafts- und Unternehmenspolitik ZNWU, Darmstadt
Abstract: 
We collect observations on how power constitutes itself in decentralized digital platform constellations that position themselves as alternatives to platforms operated by big tech (which we coin "hyperledgers"). We then compare these forms of power to the incumbent structures, the so called "hyperscalers". Such a comparison yields new insights into the way power "works" in surveillance-based platform capitalism. The crucial insight of our analysis is that it is highly unlikely that platform alternatives can be scaled up decisively within the current capitalist accumulation regime. Instead of focusing on finding business models within this regime, platform alternatives should therefore strive for regime change. This, however, would require new alliances, in particular between the victims of surveillance (workers and consumers) and the platform alternatives. The latter, in turn, would not only require massive public funding, but also support from civil society actors representing workers (i.e. unions) to be able to compete with incumbent hyperscalers.
Subjects: 
Power relations
platform and surveillance capitalism
entrepreneurial activism
organizing studies
labor relations
democratization
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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