Compeerism: How the Commons can succeed where the Silicon Valley led digital revolution failed
For this episode I spoke to Dr. Hannes Gerhardt, a Professor of Geography at the University of West Georgia. His research spans a range of topics within political geography and geoeconomics. We spoke about his new book FROM CAPITAL TO COMMONS: Exploring the Promise of a World Beyond Capitalism. During the interview we spoke about his concept of compeerism as an alternative political economy, where distrbuted ledgers play in this, and how capitalism limits our current technological landscape.
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Transcript
Hi, everyone. This is the Blockchain Socialist Podcast, and I'm here today speaking to doctor Hannes Gerhardt, who is a professor of geography at the University of West Georgia. His research spans a range of topics within political geography and geoeconomics. And he is the author of a recent book that came out around the same time as mine, called From Capital to Commons, Exploring the Promise of a World Beyond Capitalism. I had I had you on, I think, now it was maybe a bit over a year ago, to talk about a different article that you had published, kind of exploring the potential of the use of blockchains for a a commons economy. So it's very cool to see that now, you've been able to write an entire book about alternatives to capitalism and what that means, economically. So, hi, Hannes. Welcome back.
Yeah. Hi. Thank you for having me again. I think, yeah, a year, maybe two years ago, something like that.
Yeah. Yeah. So maybe, for this conversation, it'd be interesting to start from a higher level view perhaps. Last time we spoke a lot about Blockchain in the Commons, and we'll talk a bit about that for this one as well. But, in your book, you kind of start broadly, on the digital revolution and kind of its promises and how it kind of changed, kind of the economy as we know it in many ways. But what promise did the digital revolution have that maybe perhaps hasn't been fulfilled quite yet? A lot of people perhaps in the Silicon Valley, like, venture capital tech circles may think that the digital revolution has happened, and we have kind of fulfilled the best of the best. And, you know, we kind of need to, for a lot of them, lean into the capitalistic and market based elements of digital platforms as a way to kind of change the world for the better. But I think perhaps you have a a different perspective.
Yeah. So I start out with the the focus on the digital revolution because I feel that, from a leftist perspective, we need to be aware of how the economy has changed, significantly. And a lot of the writings that left has kind of looked back to, you know, the economy is very different than than what was written about back then. And so it become a much more information based, economy, and with the, with the rise of the Internet, and, and and the importance of information, we find that, there there's a lot of promise. And I guess, you know, when it first started the Internet, there was a lot of hope that, that changed, the way that we, that we organize ourselves, the way that we organize our economies, and really that we that we can shift from a, from from an economy that's based on on on scarcity to one that's more based on abundant. And and and that's essentially rooted in the fact that that this digital digital asset, this digital value can be reproduced essentially infinitely, and and and, hence, the abundance. And while that's just, applies to the digital, a lot of the, a lot of this information then has a trickle down effect into, how we do other aspects of the economy, for example, manufacturing. So there was this hope, and, I I oftentimes like to refer to, to really envision that that Marx had in his early writing, Glunt Riese, where he he envisioned really what this kind of information based economy could mean. And he thought that if, if if if the economy really becomes information based, so we're thinking here, you know, I think best way to think of it is in terms of of a highly automated economy where you don't need that much labor anymore and where most of, of production is happening based on on code, that at that point, the real value in the economy is no longer actual physical labor, but is actually in the information. And if that information then were to become, a commons basically accessible to to to the citizenry, the people, then it then, it would, really be the downfall of capitalism because you could no longer really exploit, the worker. So that was the promise. Now, of course, that thought would happen. So, how it ultimately turned out is that capitalism, geared out, the way to enclose, and profit from, from the digital and to prevent it from becoming a commons. And so that's the the major challenge is if that that promise is to be realized, that, tendency of capitalism is continuously enclosed, for the purpose of, of seeking rents and profit has to be overcome.
Yeah. I think, one of the things that I think is really, interesting or an interesting contradiction is a bit how, yeah, a lot of, media, especially in particular movies, texts, audio, whoever else, just like this podcast can very easily then be transmitted to a lot of people with very little kind of, labor being involved besides, like, me kind of, like, working, to make it happen. But I don't have to create, like, physical cassettes or, like, discs or something like that so that somebody can listen to this podcast. It just kind of gets sent, on the rails of, you know, the World Wide Web. And there Right. So there is there is this kind of, like, seed of, like, oh, we're in this world of massive kind of digital abundance. But at the same time, you know, a world of massive abundance is not able to kind of satisfy capitalism's need for ever growing profits and money and extraction. And so there is also a need to create, you know, this entire apparatus of intellectual property and basically creating a new property regime and form over information and trying to, enclose it in many ways. And, you know, we see this kind of in a very practical sense on digital platforms through DRM or digital rights management as a way to treat this very abundant kind of source, as scarce. Of course, this is very, very, very artificial, whereas a normal commodity would have, like, would actually be kind of scarce. You know, my my water bottle that I have on my desk, there's only one of them, and I can't infinitely copy it the way that I can, potentially infinitely copy, an audio file of this podcast. And so I think this kind of, like, begs the question of then, okay, if if capitalism isn't really able to, you know, if if we kind of begin to realize that this is kind of, like, a very silly system that's kind of entrap, these types of things, these these digital assets, then we need a kind of different property regime to kind of, to to make sense of this, perhaps. And so I think this is where we get to this idea of commons based peer production, which was an idea that that that, as far as I understand, was, like, heavily influenced by the rise of, of the Internet.
Yeah. Yeah. So the, commons based peer production was, is essentially, it's a, a form of of production on, the Internet. So it's done primarily digitally, through collaborative work, networked work over the Internet, that is though explicitly being produced for the comments and not for profit. So good examples here would be Wikipedia, for example, and the creation of of of an encyclopedia that essentially volunteers just, have created, and con are constantly updating. So it is a pure produced, good, and it's made available to the common. So anybody can use it and have access to it. And in a very similar way, you can reference here the, the open source, softwares, that are that are out there. And so when people started seeing that, they they started thinking, well, couldn't this be a model for, for other types of economic activity in creating not just encyclopedias, but, other types of, of information, knowledge, and then ultimately even, different types of of digitally based services. And this is, of course, where, you know, as the technology advances and that we get better and better at being able to to do these sorts of thing, the potential of commons based pure production really, explodes. And so the idea here was that maybe, and this is then moving kind of beyond the the original, thinking around this idea, which was, you know, with Yochai Binkler, who's who basically sees this commons based pure production as happening as a as a subeconomy within capitalism. It's not really challenging capitalism, but then others start taking it to the next level and saying, well, this could actually challenge capitalism. And, once you start taking it to these other level and so that, I think, then becomes really, really interesting and something I explore in the book.
Mhmm. Yeah. I guess, how does that, I guess if for me, it's it's like a lot of things actually, like, perhaps maybe not more things, but there is a significant amount of the internet that is sort of like things that people produce without the desire to make a profit off of, necessarily. But oftentimes, they are kind of done not all the time, but oftentimes done on a platform, which is a very capitalist one, which does extract from basically even though you desire not to make money off of it, the company that owns the platform in which you are maybe sharing information could be still extracting, the value that you're producing for them on their platform.
Yeah. Definitely. And so so that's that's, you know, that's the way that capitalism manages to to, to enclose and and and extract rents and and and, and and employ information, for the purpose of sale. And and I think that, you know, it was so there's so many ways that you you're talking about intellectual property. So that's one way, of course, that that they're keeping information enclosed in an artificial, dearth way. But like you said, these platforms are are are really, gatekeepers, of, of all of this, information and value, and they use that, gatekeeper function in various ways by collecting information and selling it or by, you know, advertising, putting advertisements on there to make money. So that's that's obviously a problem. And, I mean, something that, though, that I think need to be addressed here and and and that I get into in the book is is, of course, that, you know, there's there are these volunteers creating this value in in commons based pure production. But if we think about, you know, living in this type of system where we need money to survive, that's really only the people I can afford to do that, you know, that have the extra time to do that. Right? And they have a regular job where they're earning money. And so you still have that that problem of, of of, you know, artists, and and and other creators that's you know, that are presenting something they still need to feed themselves. So it's not the expectation can't be that it should just be made available to everyone, for free Yeah. Because that's not really going to solve the problem for these people. You know? They're not going to be able to actually produce this for free, and make a living off of it and and give up their day job that, you know, maybe for some capitalist. So there needs to be a bigger thinking in terms of of how can we organize, these these resources as a comment that everybody can basically benefit from.
Yeah. I think this this makes it a great time for me to slot in that. If you want to support me, you can go to patreon.com/thebokchinsocialist and help me out. But, yeah, so I think oftentimes there's there's almost, like, on the inside, there's commons based peer production, and that's kind of enclosed by, you know, the larger, capitalist, enterprise platform. But so in your book, what I found really interesting is that you kind of, developed your own your own term that you called comparism as this kind of attempt at moving to, to something else, to moving beyond capitalism, like you say in the title of the book. So could you explain a bit maybe what is comparism?
Yeah. So so comparism, I I I felt compelled to come up with, with with a new term, because I was, I guess, I I was really focusing quite a lot on, commons based pure production in the way that it was being understood by those that saw it as a challenge to capitalism. And so there's a lot, of, of scholars within that are connected to the p two p foundation, and the work of Michelle Bowens, that, take this idea of commons based pure production, and then they they really expand it and scale it up to think of how could this become an, a new mode of production. And I like that idea. I wanted to explore it further. I wanted to expand it, but I felt that commons based pure production is not the right term for it because it's still associated with Benkler and his idea that it's just the subset of capitalism and that it synergizes with capitalism. They both benefit from each other. And there's not that challenge and that conflict there. So I wanted to make it clear there's a conflict there, and the computer's, angle is one where you're you're you know, it's about trying to create an economy based on the commons and and based on pure production for the common and for commoners. That is explicit in in in in in and against capital capital and capitalism. And so the idea there is that over time, a, a push toward, a common space, economy, a compute a computer's economy would be one in which, more and more assets and values are pulled into, into a commons, into the commons and into a common economy to the point where the common economy, ultimately can outcompete the capitalist economy. Yeah. So that was that was the the the main idea behind creating the new term. And and and I I would say that the main impotent of it you know, I said it it it's based on on the comment and and trying to bring values and asset away from capital into the comment. I would say that the that the, the logic behind all of this, and this you know, I'm gonna refer to your book here because this is where, I found this really interesting, toward the end of the book where you write about the, the the Moloch d a o. Mhmm. I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing that right. Is it the Moloch d a o? Moloch d a o. Yeah. Yeah. The Moloch d a o. So the Moloch d a o, which, refers to Moloch as god of, of coordination failure who consumes our future potential, for perverse immediate gain. And that's exactly the the the impetus of computerism, the idea that really we are now, in a in an economy. We have productive potential, and the assets and the well, to, to really create a a much better world, more equitable, much wealthier for everyone, if we were able to figure out how to actually cooperate and share our resources and share the knowledge, that's out there.
Mhmm. Yeah. What I found interesting, like, when I was writing that in the book was kind of, like, Moloch is used oftentimes in crypto circles to kinda talk about failure, coordination failures. But it was interesting that the original kind of reference to Moloch that they use from the, the essay from Scott Alexander Meditations on Moloch, you know, he is referring to a poem called Howl, where they're talking about Moloch, and they're identifying Moloch as essentially capitalism in many ways. And then, you know, Scott Alexander says, oh, it's not really capitalism. It's coordination failure. So like, my my point's that, no, it's still Moloch still is capitalism. And even Marx, funny enough, kinda like the last quote I use in the book, the last chapter was Marx referencing Moloch as capital, which I thought was super
super interesting connection to me. Yeah. That was really interesting. Yeah.
But, yeah, because, like, to me, it's like, I think we we can't necessarily think of things as coordination failures, although it can it can be useful in some contexts, but that there are there is real power in the world that is coordinating without you. That is coordinating within their class and within their their economic interests. And so there's a need for us as maybe people who are part of a different economic socioeconomic class to also coordinate and also use coordinate our own economic assets and resources to, to be able to kinda the way that I can I'll I'll almost be a parasite. It's kind of like sometimes how I think about it. We do kind of need to pull pull resources from from one system to another to a to to to more the the the commons, sphere in order to make it useful for us.
Yes. I think that's absolutely, correct because, I I I find that the issue with a lot of the bottom up, vision change, they oftentimes neglect the fact that there's so much stacked against, you know, an effort to create alternative economies. And so, you know, I I see the coordination failure as, you know, if more of a collaboration failure. I guess we could if we could collaborate, we could actually all be so much better off. Right? And but the only way that that could work, is if we free up all of the resources and the information that's out there, that's hidden behind all of this artificial scarcity. If we could free that up, that would then provide us with the, the the the, the the resources, the foundation, the asset that we need, to, to create that kind of coordinated, world where we're all better off. So, yeah, we need that that kind of shift of resources into, into the comments, and that's where there's the struggle. That's where there's the the power, right, that you mentioned that, that, you know, it's not just coordination. There there's power struggles, and that's where the power struggle, I think, really, takes place.
Yeah. So then if we're thinking maybe a little bit we dig deeper into this concept of computerism, how do you think is how can someone become a computerist? How can they, live those values, you think?
I mean, I think that that that many people are computers already. And so I think that it's important to recognize that it's not just this abstract, you know, term of future individual or or political identity. I think that really anybody who is, committed to the comment and and commenting. So the process of commenting, of of creating comment and, and supporting comments, whether physical comments, like, you know, like your community guard, or, you know, maintaining a tool library or something like that, or if it's the digital comment and and contributing to the digital comment and supporting the digital comments as much as possible. I think all of those people that are engaged in that, I would consider them, in some sense, computers, maybe without them knowing it. I do think at some point, though, there probably need to be a a a more of a a macro level awakening, to where, that commitment to the comments reaches the level where where you become counter capitalist or or or start challenged, you know, actively challenging capitalism. So that, you know, that that kind of enlightenment, needs to happen. I would just wanna say something that that's related to what we were talking about before that I think also relate to to how to become a computer is is, that in many ways, this collaboration challenge or coordination failure is, I think it it's rooted in a, in a discourse and a narrative that is constantly hammered into our minds, about, you know, that that it that we have to compete with each other, that the competitive that, you know, we're in a competitive society at very individual based. And, and so there's not really the the support for for collaborative thinking. And I think that that's ultimately what has to happen is there has to be this shift, and that would be, at the root of what I would be as a as a as a kind of a a shift of broader consciousness and towards computer's consciousness, would be that realization that, that that really we would be better off in collaborating. So the way I wanna explain that is is in terms of game theory. So there's the Nash, equilibrium, which I which I talk about in the last chapter of the book, which is essentially, you know, in game theory that if we are playing a competitive game and let's say it's about, you know, a game where they the the the point of the game is to collect token. In a competitive game, we are assuming, that the, that the that our that the other people playing the game are are making certain moves against us because they want to ensure that they get the most tokens, in relationship to the other players. But if you play in this competitive way where you're constantly thinking what the other people are doing to prevent me from getting token, a lot of times, the effort is not so much in terms of collecting the token, but preventing other people from getting the token. So that ultimately ends up, limiting the total amount of tokens collected by everyone. If you shifted the rules and the parameter to where you're not playing a competitive game, but you're playing a cooperative game, where everyone cooperate to see what are the most amount of tokens that can be collected, then you would end up not only at the end of the game having collected way more tokens collectively, but each person will have ended up with more tokens than they would have if they played the game competitively. And so I think that kind of shift in consciousness where you realize that, by by by going about the organization, the governance of our resources in a collaborative, way is going to end up, being a a winning scenario for 99% of the population.
Yeah. I think there is you could almost frame it in, like, in a capitalistic way if you talk about, like, the efficiency gains from, having things in the commons rather than needing everyone needing to purchase, you know, their own, you know, their own commodities as private property, but, instead collaborating to where you can go a lot farther with a lot less, as what has been the case for most of human history. It's kind of how sometimes I see it. I'm I'm sometimes, freaking out about the the inefficiencies of capitalism, actually, driving me mad.
Yeah. I mean, I think that there are there are tremendous inefficiencies. And, I mean, just and this is, I think, would be, part of what would play into this shift of consciousness is just this, awakening to to how irrational and and sometimes really absurd capitalism had become. I mean, the the the continuous holding back of abundance. You know? I mean, it just doesn't make any sense from a if you step outside the system, doesn't make any sense or the inbuilt obsolescence of making things break, and and the degradation of of of, of ecosystem services that are giving us stuff for free, and yet we destroy them so that we we won't get free stuff. I mean, it's just there's a lot of deep irrationality and absurdities really in in capitalism that, I think that when when when we kinda wake up to that, and I think they increasingly will as the contradictions and the, and the crises of capitalism mount that that then they will start thinking more in terms of the kind of collaborative, game theory than than the competitive form. Mhmm.
So where do you see blockchains potentially playing a role in this transition? You mentioned in the book quite a few different examples of, some of the more promising, in your eyes, projects that were out there, that were kind of like, yeah, playing into this, like, potential mode of production of computerism, I guess we can say. Yeah, I guess how how do you see, blockchains playing a role in this
transition? I mean, I think there there are, there are different ways. So, you know, the way that you that you laid it out in in in your book, with regards to the different narratives and the different things that that blockchain can do, I think is really quite helpful. So, you know, on the one hand, there's the idea of, of using blockchain as as, as money, or you could use as as a as a as a form to to improve coordinate. And I think that that all of those can be, can be incorporated. So I guess the examples that I use, you know, talking about, for example, that, that that people that create digital value, that that they still need to make a living. So if if you wanna find more equitable way so I'm thinking, you know, in terms of, again, I don't think it's realistic to think that people are just gonna produce stuff for free, and that's gonna change capitalism. So there just need to be more, equitable way, of of production and, and and remuneration. And so I think that blockchain can help, in in in organizing that by, for example, creating I mean, you talk about this quite well much better in your book than I did in mine in terms of the use of NFTs in different ways that artists and musicians are, are are are finding way to, create some, access to to remuneration, to getting paid on their own terms where they're they're circumventing the middleman and they're circumventing the capitalist, which I think is, is is totally fine. That's, you know, that that's in line with, with, I think, with the computer vision, of a commons based economy. It it isn't that, you know, that you can't make any, that you shouldn't be remunerated for your work. So I think there's a lot of, possibilities there. I really like the idea of the, of of blockchain being able to help in governance. I mean, so much of the commons is about governance and about how you're going to to organize these resource in an equitable way and in a democratic way. And so there's a lot of, ways that, through the smart contract and through the DAOs that you create these systems that, that essentially managed resources in a in a way that that based on on on common's principle. You know? And lastly, there's the the hope, I guess, that, that maybe, though currencies could actually become a form of money. And I explore that in the book, but I'm I'm pretty skeptical still because it seems so far away. It's just a big challenge. But, you know, some of these, attempts like the circles, the attempts to create a, guaranteed income and digital income that's building it out from the from the inside outward, that maybe has some potential. So trying to find, ways to circulate value outside of the capitalist money system, I think that that blockchain as the type of of money, I guess, work quite well there. Especially as they start, you know, as as it gets finessed, I think, with, with time.
Yeah. I I think the ways that I kinda see it is definitely, this is question big question of governance that, the way that kind of platforms are designed today, there is not so much governance involved beyond kind of, like, the relationship between the company and the users. And then maybe in some of them, you have moderators of kind of sub communities within within the platform, but they're all encapsulated inside of it. And there is, like, a, you know, a benevolent or not so benevolent dictator at the top of of of, of that hierarchy, which is the big tech company usually. And blockchains, I think, gives this potential to to exist on the internet and produce value and, like, be able to exchange value that is outside of the root of the scope of these traditional platforms, that then breaks apart to kind of deconstructs a lot of things to where now you can kind of pick different pieces together to combine them into different kind of mechanisms and combinations of things for how you want to create your sustainable, business over the Internet, for example. And that's something that is that is very interesting and oftentimes overlooked in this conversation. And this idea, of kind of like, if you're a creator, you have a lot of risk when it comes to choosing a platform that you want to share your work on. A lot of your work is essentially not owned as far as IP, but owned as far as, like, its existence and determining whether it exists or not on these platforms, which means that if that platform dies, you can also lose a lot of your work. If you get banned for whatever reason, you can lose a lot of your work. Having a blockchain available I think there are platform like things about a blockchain, but it's still quite different as far as, it's it's being much more decentralized than than, than normal big tech platforms are, as far as kind of, like, how how its ownership is run. So, like, this question of governance and, like, thinking it then to me, it, like, made me think of capitalism as a governance mechanism, which is quite authoritarian. But it gives us kind of the different pieces that we can switch out for different things that perhaps gives us different kinds of of governance mechanisms to govern, perhaps, our assets rather than in a kind of private property regime, but in a more commons oriented property regime, which is definitely where the more interesting stuff is, of course.
Yeah. I I, I I totally agree with all of that. And I think there's a lot of really, there's a lot of potential. And one other thing that I really appreciated about your book was the, was the insistence of of keeping our eyes open or keeping our minds open to, to the potential, because the I I feel there really is. And I guess in in in line with that, I I have a, I guess, an inquiry for you, and I'm trying to wrap my head around how how blockchain could be applied to this. So, you know, the the main argument I make in the book is is ultimately that, you know, if capitalism is become to be overcome, in a peaceful transformation, so kind of an evolutionary type of transition,
then
it it would basically, it would have to be outcompeted by a new nascent form of, economic, activities similar to how, you know, how feudalism, was outcompeted by capitalism. And so, you know, I go through various examples in the book of how the comment can become in comment based economic production. And, you know, I'm thinking here in terms of a a good example of this is just, you know, cooperative the way that the cooperative system is set up very much in line with with with comments because you still have to organize, work and and and and and remuneration for that work like we've talked about before. And I think that, cooperatives are a way of of doing that and that and the governance of how that work happens, I think blockchain can be applied there. But on a bigger scale, as the commons based economy, perhaps upscales, and competes with capitalism, it's going to be a very difficult task. So one of the the arguments I make is that, is that the big benefit, to the commons would be to create, licensing that, essentially reverse engineer copyright, and, and endeavors to protect common. Because right now, the the big problem with the commons is that it free it's a free for all. Anybody can use it, and that means capitalism can use it. And capital comes, and it pilfered it, and it encloses it, and it profits it, and, and degrades it ultimately. And so it the commons are really to expand and become the foundation of a new mode of production, somehow the commons have to be protected from capital exploitation. And so a, a pure property licensing like a, I guess they also also refer to as, you know, like, a copy far left. Licensing would be a a system where, you know, there are limits to who can access the common asset or value. And so depending on who you are and what you wanna use it for, the the asset comes available to you. If you are a commons actor that is going to use it in the common you know, for the common good and for the commons, then you can have free access to it. If you're a capitalist actor, then either you don't get access or you have to pay something, and this would be a way to get resources into the commons. So they just don't get it for free. Like, Wikipedia is there for everyone, But what if it there was actually a wall where where, you know, if it was an intentional political type of entity where they said, well, no. If you're gonna use it to make money, you're gonna have to pay. And so I was wondering if, how blockchain could be used in in in in licensing in that kind of kind of far left, copy far left licensing that would because it's contractual. It seems like blockchain could be applied in something like that.
Yeah. That is a good question. I need I probably need some time to to really think about it. I think the difficulty that I'm finding is, like, how do you recognize that something is being being taken and being used in a particular way and in a way that is, like, making money, there would need to be, like, a pretty pretty robust system behind that, which also makes it kind of like, what worries me about that is perhaps the same thing that could be used for maybe enforcing a copy left is the same thing that could potentially enforce a copyright. So I would have to think a lot about that to to see how that could happen. I think kind of one of the like, there are plenty of of kind of, like, crypto hype men who, like, think that NFTs are, like, the newest thing in in copyright. And then there's people on the left who kind of react to that saying, like, we're creating digital scarcity by or you're creating digital scarcity by by using NFTs or whatever else. And kind of the one of the points that I made in the book is that NFTs don't really create any scarcity as far as, like, the legibility and consumption of the media, for the most part. But, all it does is kind of, like, gives you a way to kind of put your name next to that piece of media and say that you own it. And this is basically how a lot of art already works today. So I don't know. I think that's something that's it would require a bit of thinking, and it would probably require, perhaps another set of infrastructure to do. Because I don't see I don't yet see the possibility that we're going to have a kind of DRM type of system that uses a blockchain, which I think is a good thing. I think those are those are very different, Yeah, to enforce digital copyright, I think, is like a very it's a difficult problem that even, like, you know, Disney hasn't fully figured out yet, you know? Mhmm. So I would have to think about that, but that is a good question.
Yeah. I mean, they they have, the, you know, the normal copy left, like, the creative commons stuff you have, the various contracts and the various things that you can apply to your to your creative comments license. But I I I do agree that that that becomes more difficult if contract is, going to focus on what you use it for because that is a difficult thing to trace back, improve. And, and so I think the way that, that these, ideas are leaning is more towards, really is who is, who is using it. And so if you are, you know, if you are a a licensed nonprofit or a licensed cooperative, then you basically you have access. But if you are a for profit, then you do not have access. Yeah.
You could make it to where maybe it's kind of default. Any sort of use of this contract creates a transaction fee for the owners of that asset unless they're whitelisted because they are cooperatives or they are Right. Noncapital based entities that that then they could use it for free.
Right. Yeah. That would make it easier probably. Mhmm. Yeah. That's inter
No. Yeah. Maybe, one one final question because I would like to to help people. I think, you know, this has come up for some reason recently for me, with a lot of people, is this idea that, of course, you talk about in the beginning of the book and is is a very common one, is that people kind of lack the ability to imagine something else besides capitalism, that it's so totalizing and ingrained, you know, that we can you know, the famous quote, it's easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine the end of capitalism. Mark Fisher writes about this a lot, in his book Capitalist Realism. But, maybe let's try to break that wall a little bit. And let's try to think about, I guess for you, what would a kind of hypothetical, computerist economy look like? Take through take take me through the day of a of a computerist computerist economy
society. Yeah. I mean, there's a lot, I guess, I could say about that. But, so I think there would have to be a lot of different layers to to what would make something like that possible. I think, probably, first and foremost, there would have to be this this broader shift in consciousness, that I was talking about earlier where where people start developing more of, an understanding that they're going to get more, from the resources that we have. They go about, things collaboratively rather than competitively. And this is something that Yochai Benkler, who, you know, who came up with the idea of common space peer production. This is something that he shows over and over again that, you know, the economic, projects tend to be much more, effective in coming up with innovations and solving problems when there are many people working on it. There's openness. There's sharing as opposed to closed off siloed protectives, you know, secretive, approaches to the to to a problem or to to, you know, to an economic challenge. And so, you know, if if we just, you know, upscaling that seems to be, the way forward that there has to be kind of a broader consciousness around that, I think. Once you create that broader consciousness, I think then you could also create, you know, demands on, on the governance, arrangement that we currently have. So I think the governance arrangement would have to be different. And and so, you know, I talk about this a little bit, in the book, but, I don't I don't see that there that this can all be bay this can all be local. I think there has to be some kind of, you know, local, regional, and then even larger scale forms of governance, whether you wanna call it the state or not. The p two p foundation, had the idea of the partner state, which is essentially a state that has moved, out or basically divorced itself, from from from capital, and has reestablished a marriage with common. So just the way that capital is being supported currently by the state, it would have shifted to a a support of the common, which, of course, can only come about through a massive upheaval of of of of, a social movement of people and a a shift in consciousness. What that would look like tangent tangibly, I think, on the digital realm, there would just be a much, much more openness in terms of, in terms of the digital assets and value that are out there so there would be a significantly ratcheted back, intellectual property. Either it would be gone, especially it would be gone for the things that are truly, necessary for for human thriving, so, you know, for medications and stuff like that. But, in in in places where it might be in place still, it would be significantly shortened. And, and and you would just have really large digital commons, just this big asset, this big, kind of repository of digital value and asset that would be at your disposal, including knowledge. That would be on that side. But the other thing and that's something that we didn't talk much about, and and it kinda goes away a little bit from the the whole blockchain focus. But the point that I make in the book is that, you know, we can't just liberate the Internet and digital value. It's all rooted in the material world. So, you know, the Internet has a materiality to it. The people need to be fed, so that there's a and we still have all the goods, all the hardware to make all this stuff work. So I think the material economy also needs to be, significantly, commonized. So, basically, it needs to become more of an formed by the people. And I and I and I think that, you know, cooperatives are a very good way of going about that. The move to municipalization for certain types of utilities, I think is a is a positive movement, you know, nonprofits in some ways, in some areas. So a range of different kind of not not for profit, organizations that would then, take over more the the material side of the economy. So, I mean, that's the the broader, you know, idea here, but it you know, you just you would need the you would need the social aspect. You would need the political act, and then you would need this commonization of the digital and the physical.
Mhmm. Now I'm kind of thinking in my head. Imagine you are you are part of your cooperative or maybe a workers' cooperative that maybe you work at, and you are part of as well the, grocery cooperative in which you go and work, in which you are then sharing again, and you have your own governance mechanism there in which you're taking part in. You are also part of maybe being active in the, say, city councils or anything like that where democratic decision making is the norm for what is, like, kinda desired within your locality. And then, you know, there is perhaps larger levels of beyond that in which there are more kind of ways in which, perhaps then you would need to use digital technologies that kind of help govern, various aspects at a larger scale for what we do with resources that are owned at, you know, higher levels and higher higher layers of of of the stack, as we include higher scale and more people. There's more of a need. And so therefore, there's more of a norm that if we are part of democratically governed organizations, that we can then be more easily be able to embody these types of, the type of subject that we would need to be, to create a mode of production that is much more democratic and much less, kind of implicitly dictatorial or authoritarian as capitalism is and as corporations are basically, you know, mini fiefdoms or mini dictatorships of of the stakeholders or or shareholders. So, yeah, I guess that's kind of that's kind of how I see it, is that there is this need to the more we commonize, the more we figure out then as well embodying how to be a part of a commons, that that will translate into higher and higher scales. Whereas at the at the moment, we are quite, I guess, on on average, you know, we are a bit more individualistic. We are a bit more, you know, feeling that we're in this competition against each other, perhaps. And that translates up upwards in scale to where our governance mechanisms, at higher levels are therefore also undemocratic, also allows a lot of space for individualistic, kind of endeavors and such. So, yeah, that's got and I don't know. That that's how I kinda see it. I don't know if that's, if that made sense to you.
Yeah. No. That that that makes sense. And I mean, I don't wanna, you know, there I make this also clear in the book that, you know, the it there's no computer's Vanguard is kind of vision. You know, there's a lot of different avenues that we can take here. And I don't want to, to say there's, you know, there's only one right way. There's obviously there's lots of different ways that, that this can be approached. I like your vision. I have a, a more concrete vision. The last chapter of the book is a more concrete, that lays it out, that overlaps, quite well with with, with a lot of things that you just said. You know, what kind of a nested hierarchy of governance, lots of participation, quite radical democracy, facilitated protect you know, through technology and blockchain, I think, is very helpful here in terms of really creating that democracy, and finding different ways of, of allowing people to have a voice in many different things and facilitating it so it doesn't become so much of a burden. Yeah. Lots of cooperative. I would say that a big part of this would also be a a a guaranteed basic income, because that would free up so many people to actually contribute to the comments and to do thing, that they actually feel like doing. And so I would do that as a, as a part of it as well. I have a kind of a vision in there of a of a cultural guild, you know, where artists could become part of the guild. They give out these culture coin that you get an access to certain amounts of the culture for free. If you want, you know, beyond that kind of culture, you you pay a little bit so that these performers and these artists can actually also get paid. They have a little bit beyond just their basic income. So there's a couple of scenarios there that I go through in terms of what your normal life would look like. But, you know, it's just one example. There's lots of different ways that, that this that this can go. And and the vision I have, there is still a market in place. You know, you point this out in your book too. A market doesn't have to be capitalism. And so, I think that a market can still be in place within a within a relatively noncapitalist system. But it would have to be a very kind of confined and restricted and and regulated market.
Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on again for the second time,
Hannes. Maybe Yeah, no, this is great.
I appreciate it. Maybe just the last thing, if you want to share with people, anything you want, you would like to leave them with and where they can, potentially buy the book.
Yeah. I mean, the book is, is is an academic book. It came out with Bristol University Press. It's pretty pricey. You know, university presses oftentimes are focused on libraries and things like that. But the book is called Capital to Common. If you're interested, I would just suggest shoot me an email at, hgearhart@westga.edu. So you can just Google me. There aren't many honest Gearharts out there. I'm at the University of West Georgia. It won't be hard to find me, and I'd be happy to to, to discuss further and share any resources I have.
Great. Like a real computerist.
Yes. True to the true to the term. It would be ridiculous if it wasn't that way. Right?
Alright. Thanks so much.
Yeah. Thank you.
