A Conceptual Interrogation of Capital in a Cybernetic Environment
Cybernetic Capitalism presents a groundbreaking synthesis of Niklas Luhmann’s systems theory and critical theory. Overwijk examines how neoliberal capitalism now thrives on the management of incommunicability rather than the pursuit of total communicability, harnessing ecological complexity as its driving force. Contrary to earlier critiques that highlighted capitalism’s push to render all social life fully communicable, the current era encourages market incalculability, profits from user unpredictability, and spurs service
workers’ creativity.
This ecological logic resonates with the extractivist drive of the Anthropocene, reframing our understanding of capitalism as an adaptive, environment-attuned system. Cybernetic Capitalism also exposes how these dynamics intersect with the cultural rise of conspiracy theories and radical-right irrationalism. By illuminating capitalism’s paradoxical reliance on both rationalist and irrationalist currents, Overwijk provides a vital new lens for interpreting the complex politics of our time.
Table des matières
Introduction : Abstract Ecologies | 1
1. Critical Systems Theory: Ecological Confrontation | 15
2. Spiraling into Control: Paradoxes of Thermodynamic Rationalization | 55
3. The Vitalist Alternative: Sympoietic Multitudes | 93
4. Cybernetic Rationalization: Valorizing the Incommunicable | 121
Epilogue : Cybernetic Irrationalization | 155
Acknowledgments | 179
Notes | 183
Bibliography | 189
Index | 211
A propos de l’auteur
Jan Overwijk is NWO Rubicon Postdoctoral Fellow at the Institute for Social Research in Frankfurt am Main, Germany, and Assistant Professor at the University of Humanistic Studies in Utrecht, The Netherlands.
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