The Player and the Played: From Gamed Capitalism to 21st-Century Fascism

In an age when capitalism feels like an unwinnable game, extreme reactionary ideas and politics are on the rise. The Hunger Games, Game of Thrones, Squid Game, and much of reality TV are cultural reflections of a society of relentless, lonely competition, where each of us must become a player: a savvy risk-taker, a miniature corporation of one. But in a gamed economy we players feel played, and new forms of fascism promise harsh justice and revenge. Max Haiven's new book theorizes the connections between the financialization of the capitalist economy, the gamification of our lives, and the rising threat of a uniquely twenty-first century form of fascistic politics.

From vicious online swarmings to the QAnon conspiracy fantasy, from the siege of the US Capitol to the abuse of “free speech,” The Player and the Played analyzes the “playgrom” as a new form of extremist violence. It explores how “derivative fascisms” both repeat and reinvent the terrors of the past in a financialized form. How have we learned to love the cheats who have power but loathe the cheats without it? It unpacks the worldbuilding (and world-destroying) urge of Silicon Valley. And it poses the urgent question: What is the antifascist game?

Max Haiven is a writer, game designer and educator. We will discuss his book together with sociologist Ülker Sözen, whose work focusses on platformization and new authoritarianisms, and journalist and media scholar Enrico de Angelis, who is one of the founders of Untold Magazine.