Digital Technology as Heavy Industrial Technology: iSlavery and Environmental Destruction – London – 6th September 2017

Interrogating Digital Capitalism: A series of monthly events questioning liberal ideas of progress through technology

Digital technology powers neoliberal capitalism: it is central to globalisation, financialisation, the ‘flexible economy’, ongoing waves of automation and now, ‘big data capitalism’.

Liberals and many leftists assume that the problem is not the technology, but its abuse by corporations, the military and the state. But what if we are in a techno-social regime, in which these interests shape technology – and technology, in turn, shapes capitalism in a way that reinforces itself?

What if we are in a digital technocracy in which cybernetic principles of information capture and flexible control are becoming embedded throughout society? What if it is not just a matter of ‘rescuing the digital baby from the capitalist bathwater’?

Join us at this series of monthly events looking at current challenges raised by digital capitalism.

Event 2 – Digital Technology as Heavy Industrial Technology: iSlavery and Environmental Destruction

September 6th 2017, 7.15pm. Feminist Library meeting room, 5 Westminster Bridge Road, London SE1 7XW

Digital technology is often seen as ‘immaterial’ and ‘smart’, defining a new industrial and social paradigm.

Yet digital gadgets are produced within an ‘old-fashioned’ highly exploitative regime that has been likened to slavery, whilst the industry creates massive environmental destruction and makes a major contribution to climate change.

Jack Linchuan Qiu, author of Goodbye iSlave, will describe the conditions in Chinese electronics factories, such as Foxconn, which were brought to international attention by a wave of worker suicides in 2010.

The second speaker (guest TBC) will look at the environmental impacts of digital technology and its role in causing conflicts.

  • Free/donation
  • 7.15pm, September 6th
  • Feminist Library meeting room, 5 Westminster Bridge Road, London SE1 7XW.

Venue is accessible, we would advise wheelchair users to contact us in advance if possible.

For more information contact info@breakingtheframe.org.uk

 

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