CCG Chronicles #2 - A taxonomy of crypto-politics
This episode is a continuation of the CCG Chronicles series which is a collection of interviews conducted during the Crypto Commons Gathering (CCG) in Austria back in August 2021. The interviews were also filmed to potentially be a part of a documentary I'm making with a few others. I interviewed Vangelis Papadimitropoulos, a political theorist, social scientist and post doc researcher holding a PhD in political philosophy. Formerly a Research Affiliate at the Free University of Amsterdam and...
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Transcript
Hi, everyone. This is part two of the CCG Chronicles, which are part of a series of interviews that I took while I was attending the CryptoCommons gathering in Austria. This interview that you're about to listen to is with Vangelis Papadimitrioulos, who's a political theorist, social scientist, and postdoc researcher holding a PhD in political philosophy. He's written extensively on the topic of the commons and is expecting next year to release a book titled Blockchain and the Commons, which will be published through Routledge. During the interview, we talk about some of the research that he presented during the conference, which was essentially a taxonomy of the different political camps in the cryptosphere, which will also be covered in his new book. This interview was also the very first interview that I did in person at the Crypto Commons gathering, so I was a little bit nervous while doing it. And I hope that doesn't show too much. But I also just wanted to remind you that this interview and all the ones that are going to be published from this conference are all part of a documentary that I'm filming, which is meant to cover some of the experiences and the concepts that we found while visiting a few different crypto conferences, the crypto commons gathering being just one of them. The past couple of weeks, I've been working really hard with starting some of the video editing and beginning to create the teaser for the documentary, so hopefully some of that will be coming out soon. As well, if you check out the episode description, you'll be able to find a link to the website with a little bit more information on what types of things we'll be covering during the documentary. And if you want to help out financially, we have a couple of crypto addresses that you can donate some cryptocurrency to in Ether, NEAR, Bitcoin, and a couple of others. So, yeah, I think that's enough from me. I hope you enjoy the interview. Yeah. So we are here live when the CryptoCommons Gathering twenty twenty one, and this is my very first live interview for my podcast, actually. So, yeah. I'm here today right now with, Vangelis Papadimitriou, which I think I said right. And I know you are, you've done a lot of really interesting research. And earlier in the conference, you gave basically a really good overview of what are the different sort of political strains within the, crypto universe. But maybe before we get into all that, maybe I can ask you if you can introduce yourself and, sort of what your research interests are and, like, how you came to Blockchain.
Well, I have a PhD in, political theory and philosophy. I have worked as a teacher in Greece. And in the last seven years, I studied the commons, and I have studied also a lot about economics and about computer science, to understand how the economy works and how technology progresses and how they integrate and interrelate with each other. Politics, economics, and technology with, in relation to the commons and to the collaborative economy as a whole. Platform cooperatives, open cooperatives, and the commons, and the solidarity economy.
So these are all, like, I think it it sounds like to me that these are all sort of, like, emergent areas a bit at the moment. So, like, very Nacent. Yeah. They tend to be economies that are, I guess, similar to, like, yeah, like what you said, the the social economy sort of thing, like the collaborative with the cooperative economy. Maybe could you explain a little bit, like, how all of these different areas intersect in in your view, especially with technology, I think, in Well,
they are different spheres of society that they are interrelated. It was always like that. And if one is doing a social research, it's good to, if needed to take into account different spheres and spectrums. Like technology, like culture, like economics, like politics And to understand the commons, the current evolution of the commons was necessary to understand how the economy works as a whole, and how technology also progresses and how they interlay it into different, practical instantiations, let's say, into society.
Yeah. I I guess when it comes, like, specifically to technology, how does technology affect economy and politics? Like, is there anything special about technology specifically and why since we're at a, you know, conference about blockchain, which is a very, like, technological space. And sometimes, I think, in these technological spaces, sometimes, they like to people in this space kind of tend to ignore the other two. They tend to ignore politics and and economy and sort of use sort of, like, fetishize technology for technology's sake without thinking about its relationship to economy or politics?
Yes. This is a sort of techno determinism. No. Technolytism, techno fetishism. Basically, the my interest in the technology is because of the Internet, because of the rise of the Internet, because of the rise of open source software, and the evolution of open source software into blockchain. And, I somehow hinted in my book about the blockchain and the relation of the blockchain with the commons. And, I was planning to dive deeper into blockchain and I had the chance to do it in the last six months. So I read a lot about the blockchain. I'm trying to follow-up with the projects and the initiatives and the cryptocurrencies and the crypto sphere, and try to, see the different approaches in the commons in general, try to see them, how how how they, actualize in, the cryptosphere, how they, yeah, how they blend into the, cryptosphere. And that's how I show these three different approaches. The liberal, the reformist, the post capitalist and the anti capitalist. How they merge into different, strains strains in the the crypto sphere like the crypto libertarians, the crypto liberals, the crypto institutionalists, the neo institutions, and the crypto commoners.
Right. So maybe it would be really interesting if we can go one by one, each one into a little bit of detail to see, like so that we can make the difference between what these different strains are. In the block in the blockchain. Yeah. So, like, maybe we can talk about first crypto libertarianism. What what is specific to this particular, like, political strain within
the crypto space? The champion market fundamentalism, the invisible hand of the market, the the idea of the free market, this Crypto libertarianism. There are different strains within a Crypto libertarianism. We have a right wing, libertarianism, left wing, libertarianism.
Would you say there's a left wing crypto libertarianism?
There is. Yes. Okay. Usually There are people who are embracing market, free markets, and they try to relate them to the state and to institutions. Yes, of course. And new institutionalism also relates to, crypto libertarianism. And there there are crypto liberals also. Crypto liberalism, puts weight on the state. Crypto libertarians want to do away with the state. Crypto liberals, they say that the state is necessary. You cannot do without the state.
We need to be like, people who are really interested in, for example, central bank digital currencies or CBECs.
Oh, absolutely. Yes. They they they are billionaires. Yeah. Of course. And they are post Kansians, neo Kansians who advocate the central role of the state in, in the economy. And and then we go to, crypto commoners who also relate with all the other trends, but they tend more to the commons. They have more, neo institutionary elements, evolutionary
elements. What do you mean by neo institution?
Institutionalism is, basically the Ostrom school. It focuses on, on, the structure of institutions. They don't focus solely on, on on the free market, on how the markets work, but they also integrate the culture and and the norms of society into how the economy works. So they basically, they say that it's not only the invisible hand of the market and from market fundamentalism and supply demand and individualism that define who we are, but also culture and norms. How we live, what we do, why do why we do what we do, morals, religion, whatever. Culture, they all interrelate into different sorts of institutions. This is neo institutionalism.
So then is it that, would you say that crypto commoners are anti or pro state?
There are crypto commoners who are anti state. There are crypto communists who are pro state. There are middle levels of abstraction. And they they are post Marxist also. They they are autonomous Marxists also in the in the sphere. Yeah. Yeah. There are different trends, different approaches. Yeah.
So Emmett's a a crypto liberalist. I don't know if you've read much into Janus Verfolakis, his talks or, like, writings about cryptocurrency?
Yeah. Jens Van Vyck is, is a critical of, crypto.
He's he's critical of Bitcoin, what I've noticed for sure, which I understand. I think that removes him from the crypto libertarian strain. But he's I think what he advocates for, it seems to be, is, he seems to be pro CBDCs or at least he's pro, removing, like, retail banking from the financial infrastructure as a way to have more control over your monetary system rather than basically having this, like, half privatized financial system.
Again, Sofakis mixes some elements of, liberalism, libertarianism, and Marxism, and post Keynesianism. He's pro blockchain. He is for he supports the technology. He recognizes the value of blockchain technology, but he's critical of Bitcoin in in terms of supply and demand. He thinks that, Bitcoin is a deflationary that in terms of in times of crisis, you need a state to inject the economy with supply. Of course, he doesn't know that there are blockchain solutions to tackle this issue. I think I suggest that he doesn't know it. At least in the book that I read, there is no mention of that. Right. Perhaps now he is more aware of it. I don't know.
Maybe we can get in contact with him and, and share with some of the No. No. I have met with, Jan van Faikis. Yes. Yes. But,
yeah, I don't know him. No. In some way. No. No.
Yeah. Yeah. Maybe he can, reach out to you as a blockchain.
I don't know what he can do and then what he cannot do. I cannot do that.
Yeah. Is there any other, like, like, parts of your research that you want that you've, like, uncovered as part of your research, like, in regarding these sort of, like, political strains that you wanna mention?
No. Not really. I'm I'm interested in the contradictions of the commons that arise. There are very various contradictions in technical social challenges that I see.
Yeah. What kind of contradictions do you what are the most what are the most glaring ones maybe?
That, some people, have are getting paid and some people are not getting paid, This is a basic one. Some the the contradiction between commerciality and non commerciality. There there are people who don't want money. There are people who are for money, and for markets, there are, yeah, different sorts of different sorts of,
tensions, tensions if you want. Within like the crypto commoner? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You
you you you heard it here also today, these days. I think there are people who are pro access, people who are, protokens. So there are different approaches. And this reveal crystalize the inherent contradictions of, of the commons because, yeah, there are also
yeah. I think, I mean, I'm, you know, I'm I'm sort of Marxist, so, like, sometimes with, with commenting, sometimes I get, like, it seems to, like, it sort of ignores the issue of class a bit for me. I don't know if that's, do you think that's that's part of it? Like, if we just sort of call everyone commoners but not really analyze the This is true that
class relations are not Clear. Clear in, or adopted if you want, in in the crypto commons, sphere. Apart from the autonomous Marxist, the people who are, more, yeah, who and post Marxist. Yeah. They sort of, I think, adopt a more, differential view of of class because the very term of class okay. The basic division exists between the directors and executives. Okay? Between bosses and the workers, there is it is one it is the core contradiction of our economy and society Yeah. And of the state. But the there are, the the concept of the class and the the term of the class and the the very existence of classes in the last twenty, thirty years, have multiplied and they occupy different, class positions. A worker can be can be an owner of a bar, of a house, can be a rentier, can own some shares. Eric Olin Eric Olin Wright has written about how the the evolution of of the class has play played out in the last century.
Like stratification.
Exactly. The the stratification of, of, professions, of different professions. In post Marxist, they call it different subject positions. Someone can be a worker, but can has also other identities. Can be a commoner, can be an entrepreneur, can occupy different, subject positions in discourse analysis. Yeah. In the work of Laclau and Move, for example.
I feel like that's a very, like, very neoliberal type of effect. Like, what neoliberalism has sort of created is, like, it's done everything that it can so that we don't identify as workers, but we identify with all these other different identities that we can possibly identify so that we don't recognize our the position as workers.
It has played some role, for sure. Yes. But basically, neoliberalism has to do with the projection of the market into the state. This is the basic idea Yeah. Concept of neoliberalism. I think, this also relates to the new left of the seventies, where we have the politics of identity. Yeah. The rights of women, of minorities, and, different classes, also emerging within the major division. So it doesn't have to do only with the neoliberalism.
One thing that I think maybe we should ask and what I want to ask, I think everybody that I interviewed just to see so we can, like, compare how people answer this question, you know, across we have so many people from so many different areas. But But I was curious to ask you, like, what does the crypto commons mean to you? It is a beacon of hope.
I see a beacon of, hope. And I see well, actually, I see there is a movement. There is there are things happening. There is action. And as a researcher, I want to investigate it, to do research on that. And I do I try to do empirical research, not only theoretical work because theory has to combine with, praxis, with, action and with, empirical, findings. So, yeah, there are there are things happening. And, technology is a major contributor on that. And the open source software technology has amplified, the whole, thing, especially in the last one, two years with the cryptocurrencies, etcetera. You can see it. I think it's obvious. And seeing here so many projects around the crypto commons, 25 how many projects. Yeah. But still, okay. It's a it's a it's an emergent phase, a nascent phase, and we will see where, it will go and how it will evolve and develop.
Do you have any advice for maybe these projects or these people who are in the crypto common space who want to deal with their contradictions? To connect to each other
and to be transparent.
Like I said, how we're doing now?
Yeah. Yeah. Conference. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. To connect to each other, to share. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, to be open and to connect to each other. And, and we need also institutions. We need the the state also to help with, legislation, with funding. We need a chain of equivalence of we need a holistic coordination mechanism between, different projects. To unite into a movement, into a whole a whole movement because only by not only, but it's helpful if you have unity combining with, going along with pluralism. A unity of pluralism to to change, to pro to create a paradigm.
Are you still hopeful even with contradictions? With these contradictions and I think because I I I've noticed, Denise, throughout the conference, there are quite some differences. Like, we can talk I think we have this is a group of if if we consider, like, people at this conference are best part of the crypto commons movement, not everyone agrees with everything, and some some disagreements are bigger than others. But there's at least an agreement that things are pretty fucked and that we need something we need to change something,
quite radically and quite big. Yeah. Things Things are pretty fucked in the last, I don't know.
Yeah. They've been fucked for a while. Yeah. Yeah.
But I see that there is a culture of communication for sure and of exchange of ideas. And, yeah, this is a positive message I get. Mhmm. I think that, yeah, there are differences, but there is discussion on the differences, and there is communication on the differences. That makes you hopeful I guess? That makes me hopeful, yes. I see that there is a culture of trying to to deal with the difference, to tackle the difference, to integrate the difference, to tolerate the difference. Mhmm. Yeah. Because this is you cannot difference is the the source of, of living and meaning and, nature and, yeah, and society. Yeah. Yeah.
I I I can agree it's been pretty, there have been some debate and, like, heated discussion, but not like, yeah, outright, rejection of someone else or, like, you know, terrible fights or anything? No. No.
Yeah. No. No. Nothing like that. It's really, yeah, pretty silly. Yeah. Definitely.
And maybe to to to end it off, this has been really great, and it's been so great to meet you in person. And thank you for being my first guinea pig for a live podcast.
Thank you
also. Thank you very much. Yeah. Maybe it's a standard you can share with people if you have anything, that where people can follow you and keep up with your work that you want to share. Well, I'm writing,
my second book right now on the contradictions of cyber fiscal, commons. Mostly examine the the give the case of the common stock, the common stock case. I focus, there. And I have, all my papers are open. They can find everybody can find whatever he or she wants on Google. I have all my papers uploaded on on the internet and they can find whatever they want there.
Cool. Well, thanks a lot for this. Thanks a lot.