The Politics of Bitcoin: Software as Right-Wing Extremism

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U of Minnesota Press, Sep 26, 2016 - Computers - 100 pages

Since its introduction in 2009, Bitcoin has been widely promoted as a digital currency that will revolutionize everything from online commerce to the nation-state. Yet supporters of Bitcoin and its blockchain technology subscribe to a form of cyberlibertarianism that depends to a surprising extent on far-right political thought. The Politics of Bitcoin exposes how much of the economic and political thought on which this cryptocurrency is based emerges from ideas that travel the gamut, from Milton Friedman, F.A. Hayek, and Ludwig von Mises to Federal Reserve conspiracy theorists.

Forerunners: Ideas First is a thought-in-process series of breakthrough digital publications. Written between fresh ideas and finished books, Forerunners draws on scholarly work initiated in notable blogs, social media, conference plenaries, journal articles, and the synergy of academic exchange. This is gray literature publishing: where intense thinking, change, and speculation take place in scholarship.

 

Contents

Bitcoin Digital Culture and RightWing Politics
1917
Central Banking Inflation and RightWing Extremism
1932
An Overview of Bitcoin
1945
Central Banking Conspiracy Theories
1960
Software as Political Program
1972
The Future of Bitcoin and the Blockchain
1987
Acknowledgments
2000
Notes
2001
Bibliography
2003

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About the author (2016)

 

David Golumbia (1963–2023) taught in the English Department and the Media, Art, and Text PhD program at Virginia Commonwealth University. He was the author of The Cultural Logic of Computation and many articles on digital culture, language, and literary studies and theory.

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