The Los Metas Cartel: Platforms, Imperialism, and Narco-Estate
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.22409/hsrdng77Keywords:
Platforms, Company-states, Imperialism, Drug cartel, Toxic contentAbstract
The concept of company-state was coined to describe the role of the East India Company (EIC) in the British colonization of Asia. The concept has been employed by platform studies to describe the enormous power that platforms wield over their users and their transnational operations in service of imperialism. Here, we highlight a third dimension of the comparison: the centrality of opium in the EIC's business model. This article argues that a similar logic also applies to platforms, whose business model is based on the distribution of toxic and harmful content to promote user engagement.
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