While crypto-assets (often misnamed " cryptocurrencies ") serve
concretely, and unfortunately very effectively, as a vehicle fordisseminating libertarian ideology and spreading very reactionaryeconomic thought, too few people are actively fighting against thisindustry, which takes advantage of the vagueness left by technology tofool the general public, and the fashion for technological solutionismto seduce leaders. ---- Until the end of May 2023, there was not yet areference work, a critical minimum, in French on the subject. This isfinally the case with No Crypto. How Bitcoin Bewitched the Planet, byNastasia Hadjadji. From the introduction, the author situates her point : " This bookoffers a political reading of crypto-assets rooted in Critical InternetTheory, a social science discipline that highlights the power structuresthat are expressed through code and technologies, emphasizing the placeof ideology in the dissemination of these objects ". Yes, the subject ofcrypto-assets is political, and should be treated as such. Those forwhom this is not obvious will be convinced by the author over the sixchapters of the book and whose titles leave little room for ambiguity :" The cult of Bitcoin ", " The roots of an e-deology ", " The golden ageof the scam ", " The ecological disaster ", " Crypto-colonialism andpredatory inclusion ", and to finish driving the point : " Politics ofBitcoin ".Indeed, No Crypto is a comprehensive work, which ranges from thesociological analysis of the users of crypto-assets to the politicalanalysis of the principles intrinsic to the functioning of theunderlying technologies, through in-depth analyzes of the uses made ofthem, at all levels : economic (scams), ecological (energy andpollution), social (predatory inclusion), geopolitics (neo-colonialism).The final chapter is somewhat of a condensed and updated form of DavidGolumbia's 2016 book, The Politics of Bitcoin, Software as Right-WingExtremisn, which I also recommend reading.Pleasantly surprising to libertarians, unlike most critical work oncryptoassets, here the author explicitly says that the dichotomypresented in crypto-adept discourse between an authoritarian state and aderegulated free market is a " simplifying alternative " that serves to" evade the fact that one can both criticize state-organized coercionand the crypto industry ". Nastasia Hadjadji indeed shows very well inher book the acquaintances of capitalist states with the crypto-assetindustry in the same way as with the rest of finance, from which thisindustry does not really stand out, except by pushing its mostpernicious concepts to their climax...It is not to the readership of Alternative Libertaire that we are goingto learn it: real emancipation is not permitted without getting rid ofall forms of imposed authorities, whether by a State or by a privatepower through a market. By definition, emancipation indeed requiresgetting rid of all enslavement, whatever it may be. Rejecting theultra-individualistic world of savage competition promised byblockchain-based technologies does not mean condoning the capitalistbanking system, and it certainly does not mean condoning the stateeither. As libertarians, it is essential for us to fight against thisfalse dichotomy systematically present in the speeches of crypto-adepts.Reading No Crypto will give you all the tools to argue in this direction.Pablo (UCL Saint-Denis)Nastasia Hadjadji, No Crypto. How Bitcoin bewitched the planet,Divergences, 2023, 220 pages, 16 euros.https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Lire-Hadjadji-No-Crypto-Comment-Bitcoin-a-envoute-la-planete_________________________________________A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C EBy, For, and About AnarchistsSend news reports to A-infos-en mailing listA-infos-en@ainfos.ca
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