Uneven Datafication: Political Economy of Digital Colonial Capitalism - Prof. Dr. Azadeh Akbari - Universität Hamburg
- Lecture2Go
- Videokatalog
- F.6 - Mathematik, Informatik, Naturwissenschaften
- Informatik
- Taming the Machines - The Philosophy, Ethics and Politics of AI
Videokatalog
59 Aufrufe
03.06.2026
Uneven Datafication: Political Economy of Digital Colonial Capitalism
Goethe-Universität Frankfurt, DE
This paper develops the concept of uneven datafication, drawing on literature on coloniality, uneven development, and dependency theory. Uneven datafication refers to uneven development in the contemporary political economy of data, showing how global cycles of differentiation and totalisation perpetuate inequality to sustain capitalist structures. Datafication is neither homogeneous nor universal, but marked by colonial continuities, spatial differentiation, and temporal unevenness. Uneven datafication operates through three interrelated dynamics. First, territorialisation, deterritorialisation, and reterritorialisation produce uneven geographies of digital colonial capitalism, from datafied bodies to platform infrastructures and space-based data centres. Second, dispossession enacts spatial, temporal, and dehumanising violence, ranking populations as more or less valuable and enforcing biopower ‘within’ and necropower ‘beyond’. Third, unequal exchange sustains asymmetrical valuation and circulation of data and data labour, enabling Big Tech and core economies to extract surplus value from peripheral regions.
Uneven datafication thus sustains colonial capitalist accumulation through differentiated dispossession and dependency across populations, spaces, and classes.
Technischer Support
Bitte klicken Sie auf den nachfolgenden Link und füllen Sie daraufhin die notwendigen Felder aus, um unser Support-Team zu kontaktieren!
Link zu der RRZ-Support-Seite