Quão disruptivas? Para a crítica da internet do valor

Abstract

This work is dedicated to investigating the disruptive potential of technologies related to the so-called internet of value. Beyond the unwary enthusiasts, a considerable part of actors in this new world proclaims a revolution – still little perceived, but latent – in society and in its forms of organization. It is said that cryptocurrencies, blockchain, DLTs (Distributed Ledger Technologies), peer-to-peer (P2P) platforms, in short, the most varied forms of state machine replication for new economic-financial solutions, in addition to solving the problem of the global mobility of “value(s)”, will revolutionize the centralized and hierarchical models of social coordination, both in the public and private spheres. However, it is questioned the quality and the depth of the transformations that these technologies can operate in real effectiveness if they remain attached to the essential social forms of the commodity-producing society. In this sense, the hypothesis defended is that, if a pragmatic-technicist orientation (of “trust in the code”) is maintained to solve the complex problems of centralization, hierarchy, governance and distribution of power, without putting in perspective its eminently social roots, the internet of value and the technologies that compose it will tend to format themselves into the existing structure, not only reproducing but also helping to expand the social institutions that they intended to fight (states, banks, corporations etc.), just as the technologies of the internet, social media, and sharing platforms have given up their anarchic and libertarian ambitions to fit the incessant movement of money that needs to generate more money.