Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: This article proposes Political Economy of Data (PED) as a more appropriate analytical category than the concept of “internet governance” for understanding contemporary disputes in the global digital arena. It is argued that the language of governance tends to obscure the power structures that organize the digital space, favoring a technocratic, liberal, and functionalist approach that is oblivious to the asymmetries of informational capitalism. In contrast, PDEC allows us to reveal the links between data, infrastructure, power, and capital reproduction, positioning the analysis in the field of International Political Economy (IPE). It is further argued that the Global South should be understood not only as a space impacted by these transformations, but as an epistemic and political subject capable of disputing the rules of the digital game. Finally, a brief systematization of initiatives promoted by actors from the Global South is presented, highlighting alternative forms of regulation, use, and appropriation of infrastructure and data, with an emphasis on experiences of state infrastructure such as Pix. The article is anchored in Critical Theory of International Relations, assuming a commitment to the transformation of structures that perpetuate exclusion and domination in the digital field.
Author: Stéfano Mariotto de Moura
Institution: Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: diamond
OpenAlex ID: W4414243264
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