Toward a Minor Tech:Gloerich5000 - Revision history

Simoon: /* Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter */

2023-09-13T10:53:06Z

Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:53, 13 September 2023
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	With this article, I explore the connections between blockchain technology, coloniality, and decolonial practices. Drawing on Sylvia Wynter’s thought on the interdependent systems of colonialism, capitalism, and knowledge, as well as more recent work on the coloniality of digital technologies, I argue that blockchain-based systems reproduce certain dynamics at work in historical colonialism. Additionally, Wynter’s decolonial propositions provide a generative framework to understand countercultural practices with. Inspired by Wynter, Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics. I apply this notion to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.		With this article, I explore the connections between blockchain technology, coloniality, and decolonial practices. Drawing on Sylvia Wynter’s thought on the interdependent systems of colonialism, capitalism, and knowledge, as well as more recent work on the coloniality of digital technologies, I argue that blockchain-based systems reproduce certain dynamics at work in historical colonialism. Additionally, Wynter’s decolonial propositions provide a generative framework to understand countercultural practices with. Inspired by Wynter, Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics. I apply this notion to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.

			<div class="page-break"></div>

			==Introduction==
	<blockquote>“Human beings are magical.” (Wynter ”The Pope must have been drunk” 35)</blockquote>		<blockquote>“Human beings are magical.” (Wynter ”The Pope must have been drunk” 35)</blockquote>

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	The interplay between coloniality and the expansion of capitalism into new domains through contemporary datafication practices is a central feature in Couldry and Mejias’ thinking on data colonialism’s “distortions of knowledge through power” (Nick Couldry & Ulises Ali Mejias ”The decolonial turn” 795). Much work has been done in recent years to uncover the many ways in which algorithmic systems produce a Western system of knowledge that actively exclude those deemed Other. Notably, Safiya Noble and Ruha Benjamin show how algorithmic systems and automation reinforce racial categories and social divisions, all while proclaiming neutrality and scientific objectivity (Noble; Benjamin), a move that mirrors directly with Wynter’s theory of the overrepresentation of Western Man through scientific means. Many more examples of the current technologised functioning of colonialist knowledge systems exist, for example, tracing the legacy of Carl Lennaeus’ categorisation of nature and humanity in the algorithms we use today (Dzodan 34-43), how these logics get “made flesh” through machine learning algorithms (Dixon-Román & Parisi 117-18), and the pseudoscientific anthropometric methods of 19th century anthropology that persist in today’s biometrics (Wevers 98).		The interplay between coloniality and the expansion of capitalism into new domains through contemporary datafication practices is a central feature in Couldry and Mejias’ thinking on data colonialism’s “distortions of knowledge through power” (Nick Couldry & Ulises Ali Mejias ”The decolonial turn” 795). Much work has been done in recent years to uncover the many ways in which algorithmic systems produce a Western system of knowledge that actively exclude those deemed Other. Notably, Safiya Noble and Ruha Benjamin show how algorithmic systems and automation reinforce racial categories and social divisions, all while proclaiming neutrality and scientific objectivity (Noble; Benjamin), a move that mirrors directly with Wynter’s theory of the overrepresentation of Western Man through scientific means. Many more examples of the current technologised functioning of colonialist knowledge systems exist, for example, tracing the legacy of Carl Lennaeus’ categorisation of nature and humanity in the algorithms we use today (Dzodan 34-43), how these logics get “made flesh” through machine learning algorithms (Dixon-Román & Parisi 117-18), and the pseudoscientific anthropometric methods of 19th century anthropology that persist in today’s biometrics (Wevers 98).

	~~Arguing for the need~~ to ~~nuance~~ Couldry and Mejias’ definitions, Catriona Gray argues that data colonialism is about “the interaction of orders of knowledge with orders of value” (Gray 10). She emphasises the way that the data about everyday life produced by contemporary platforms “do not appear simply in a pre- or non-commodified form” like nature or human life did for historical colonialism, but are produced always already in relation to economic value (Ibid. 14). Those that are recognised can participate in the system, in the market, in the processes of everyday life. Those that are not recognised, and are effectively placed outside of the human category, cannot participate. Gray’s observations are particularly important in the context of financial technology such as blockchain. The climate projects mentioned above, map onto the Amazon rainforest an order of knowledge – what is represented as rainforest, in what way is it hierarchised, and what is not represented and effectively does not exist in the system – that is at the same time an order of value – how are things mapped onto economic value and made tradable? In addition, an order of agency emerges as well: who has the capacity to act and to control that which is represented and mapped onto that order of value?		Offering an update to Couldry and Mejias’ definitions, Catriona Gray argues that data colonialism is about “the interaction of orders of knowledge with orders of value” (Gray 10). She emphasises the way that the data about everyday life produced by contemporary platforms “do not appear simply in a pre- or non-commodified form” like nature or human life did for historical colonialism, but are produced always already in relation to economic value (Ibid. 14). Those that are recognised can participate in the system, in the market, in the processes of everyday life. Those that are not recognised, and are effectively placed outside of the human category, cannot participate. Gray’s observations are particularly important in the context of financial technology such as blockchain. The climate projects mentioned above, map onto the Amazon rainforest an order of knowledge – what is represented as rainforest, in what way is it hierarchised, and what is not represented and effectively does not exist in the system – that is at the same time an order of value – how are things mapped onto economic value and made tradable? In addition, an order of agency emerges as well: who has the capacity to act and to control that which is represented and mapped onto that order of value?

	Furthermore, I argue that there is another way in which blockchain technology reproduces the logics of the order of knowledge Wynter described. Moving from medieval religious understandings of reality through to versions of reality that are increasingly based on ideological Western humanism that operate under the guise of neutrality and objectivity, the invention of Man presents itself as truth while being selective in its representations (Erasmus 50). The medieval divinely ordered world in which humans, which were thought to be sinful by nature, could redeem themselves through pious behaviour, was a truth upheld by religious authorities. The subsequent version of truth ordered the world into the rationality of civilised Man or the irrational savageness of Others. The truth that is dominant until today orders the world through biological essentialism and economic logics. The inventions of Man were in effect the inventions of truth upheld through colonial power relations (Wynter ”Unsettling the coloniality of being” 291).		Furthermore, I argue that there is another way in which blockchain technology reproduces the logics of the order of knowledge Wynter described. Moving from medieval religious understandings of reality through to versions of reality that are increasingly based on ideological Western humanism that operate under the guise of neutrality and objectivity, the invention of Man presents itself as truth while being selective in its representations (Erasmus 50). The medieval divinely ordered world in which humans, which were thought to be sinful by nature, could redeem themselves through pious behaviour, was a truth upheld by religious authorities. The subsequent version of truth ordered the world into the rationality of civilised Man or the irrational savageness of Others. The truth that is dominant until today orders the world through biological essentialism and economic logics. The inventions of Man were in effect the inventions of truth upheld through colonial power relations (Wynter ”Unsettling the coloniality of being” 291).
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	Another example relates to the way that the abstractions of tokenisation invisibilise the care that is needed to sustain that which is represented on a blockchain. The logics of care and capitalism generally oppose each other (Lynch 203), and therefore, perhaps care could be a chisel for blockchain-based plot work to carve a space that offers an alternative to its surroundings. Artist Sarah Friend undermines the speculative financial alienation of many NFT projects by programming her Lifeforms NFTs in such a way that they ‘die’ if they are not cared for. In her operationalisation of care, this means that the NFT has to be given away for free to someone else, who then takes over the caring responsibilities (Friend). Lifeforms offers up a different way of relating, not only to the NFT, but also to those around you, calling on them to care for instead of capitalise on something.		Another example relates to the way that the abstractions of tokenisation invisibilise the care that is needed to sustain that which is represented on a blockchain. The logics of care and capitalism generally oppose each other (Lynch 203), and therefore, perhaps care could be a chisel for blockchain-based plot work to carve a space that offers an alternative to its surroundings. Artist Sarah Friend undermines the speculative financial alienation of many NFT projects by programming her Lifeforms NFTs in such a way that they ‘die’ if they are not cared for. In her operationalisation of care, this means that the NFT has to be given away for free to someone else, who then takes over the caring responsibilities (Friend). Lifeforms offers up a different way of relating, not only to the NFT, but also to those around you, calling on them to care for instead of capitalise on something.

	~~Another~~ third example is the Corn Council, a DAO imagined as part of a speculative design research project (Heitlinger et al.). Central in it is the wish to undo the alienation that plantation capitalism produces. This DAO rewards “spending time with plants, [...] caring for them, kindling new care-taking relationships” (Ibid. 11). Although they are tokenised, these rewards are not exchangeable and can only be used in the community in ways that support the commons. The Corn Council creates a multi-species community in which crops are stakeholders rather than commodities (Ibid. 12). These are some budding examples of how blockchain’s plot might be thought of as places in which different social relations can take root and grow, while also always being embedded in larger systems of extraction.		A third example is the Corn Council, a DAO imagined as part of a speculative design research project (Heitlinger et al.). Central in it is the wish to undo the alienation that plantation capitalism produces. This DAO rewards “spending time with plants, [...] caring for them, kindling new care-taking relationships” (Ibid. 11). Although they are tokenised, these rewards are not exchangeable and can only be used in the community in ways that support the commons. The Corn Council creates a multi-species community in which crops are stakeholders rather than commodities (Ibid. 12). These are some budding examples of how blockchain’s plot might be thought of as places in which different social relations can take root and grow, while also always being embedded in larger systems of extraction.

	== Sylvia Wynter's 'plot': a different cosmogony to understand life through ==		== Sylvia Wynter's 'plot': a different cosmogony to understand life through ==
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	<blockquote>[W]hat I want to uncover, to reveal, here is that which lies behind the ostensible truths of our everyday reality, but which we normally cannot see. It is that of the dynamic of what I now call the autopoiesis of being hybridly human. (Wynter in Wynter & McKittrick 27, emphasis in original)</blockquote>		<blockquote>[W]hat I want to uncover, to reveal, here is that which lies behind the ostensible truths of our everyday reality, but which we normally cannot see. It is that of the dynamic of what I now call the autopoiesis of being hybridly human. (Wynter in Wynter & McKittrick 27, emphasis in original)</blockquote>

	To Wynter, ‘the plot’ is not only an analogy for a place to practice difference, but it also represents a different cosmogony to understand life through. De Vries explains: the plot is “a conceptual tool and historic reality. It is figurative language and a challenge to current spatial arrangements. It is a verb and a narrative device” (de Vries 12, emphasis in original). ~~Simply put, it~~ is a place and a story. Exactly this irreducibility makes the term so valuable. Wynter’s history of the invention of Man shows how social ordering of life, and the real experiences that are a consequence of this ordering, are wrapped up with the ontological question of what (human) life is, and the coloniality of the powers at play in answering this question. In this process, Man constitutes the human first and foremost in biological terms, and pushes those that do not fit these terms into spaces of Otherness. However, Wynter adds, humans are always a hybrid, natural and cultural, biological beings and storytellers (Wynter ”Unsettling the coloniality of being” 295, 313-314). Reflecting on these ideas, Katherine McKittrick concisely summarises humans, in the universalised form of Man, as ~~“storytellers~~ who now storytellingly invent themselves as being purely ~~biological”~~ (McKittrick in Wynter & McKittrick 11, emphasis in original). Exactly this realisation is what offers potential for a different future. Wynter writes that as hybrid beings, we have a		To Wynter, ‘the plot’ is not only an analogy for a place to practice difference, but it also represents a different cosmogony to understand life through. De Vries explains: the plot is “a conceptual tool ''and'' historic reality. It is figurative language ''and'' a challenge to current spatial arrangements. It is a verb ''and'' a narrative device” (de Vries 12, emphasis in original). It is a place ''and'' a story. Exactly this irreducibility makes the term so valuable. Wynter’s history of the invention of Man shows how social ordering of life, and the real experiences that are a consequence of this ordering, are wrapped up with the ontological question of what (human) life is, and the coloniality of the powers at play in answering this question. In this process, Man constitutes the human first and foremost in biological terms, and pushes those that do not fit these terms into spaces of Otherness. However, Wynter adds, humans are always a hybrid, natural and cultural, biological beings and storytellers (Wynter ”Unsettling the coloniality of being” 295, 313-314). Reflecting on these ideas, Katherine McKittrick concisely summarises humans, in the universalised form of Man, as “''storytellers who now storytellingly invent themselves as being purely biological''” (McKittrick in Wynter & McKittrick 11, emphasis in original). Exactly this realisation is what offers potential for a different future. Wynter writes that as hybrid beings, we have a

	<blockquote>uniquely auto-instituting mode of living being, we humans cannot pre-exist our cosmogonies or origin myths/stories/narratives anymore than a bee, at the purely biological level of life, can pre-exist its beehive. (Wynter ”The ceremony found” 213, emphasis in original)</blockquote>		<blockquote>uniquely auto-instituting mode of living being, we humans cannot pre-exist our cosmogonies or origin myths/stories/narratives anymore than a bee, at the purely biological level of life, can pre-exist its beehive. (Wynter ”The ceremony found” 213, emphasis in original)</blockquote>
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	Wynter’s thought is useful in understanding the coloniality in contemporary systems, but it is also generative towards different futures. In response to De Vries, I have argued to understand the countercultural prefigurative capacities of DAOs as a form of the artistic plot work. In Wynter’s unpublished but influential manuscript titled Black Metamorphosis: New Natives in a New World, she writes that “decentralized groups” working in relation to a “framework of belief” have the capacity to “create a counter world” in which participants are involved “creatively in their destiny” (Wynter ”Black metamorphosis” 183-184). The organisational practices of these decentralised groups are what gives Wynter hope. The way in which they allow members to shape their own futures through collaboration and spiritual practices that “attain a more authentic order of being” than coloniality provides (Ibid. 184). The reality machines of DAO-based plots are a way for this decentralised work toward new mythologies and new social relations to take shape.		Wynter’s thought is useful in understanding the coloniality in contemporary systems, but it is also generative towards different futures. In response to De Vries, I have argued to understand the countercultural prefigurative capacities of DAOs as a form of the artistic plot work. In Wynter’s unpublished but influential manuscript titled Black Metamorphosis: New Natives in a New World, she writes that “decentralized groups” working in relation to a “framework of belief” have the capacity to “create a counter world” in which participants are involved “creatively in their destiny” (Wynter ”Black metamorphosis” 183-184). The organisational practices of these decentralised groups are what gives Wynter hope. The way in which they allow members to shape their own futures through collaboration and spiritual practices that “attain a more authentic order of being” than coloniality provides (Ibid. 184). The reality machines of DAO-based plots are a way for this decentralised work toward new mythologies and new social relations to take shape.

	These plots ~~offers~~ room for alternative social systems, but Wynter is clear: the plantation and its exploitative market logics are strong and will endure, at least for the time being. The plot can provide a place to find “a focus of criticism against the impossible reality in which we are enmeshed” (Wynter 100). Everyone is undeniably involved in that which is critiqued, but participating in the plot means that there is ambiguity in that involvement. This is where resistance, however marginal, finds its breeding ground (Ibid. 100-01).		These plots offer room for alternative social systems, but Wynter is clear: the plantation and its exploitative market logics are strong and will endure, at least for the time being. The plot can provide a place to find “a focus of criticism against the impossible reality in which we are enmeshed” (Wynter 100). Everyone is undeniably involved in that which is critiqued, but participating in the plot means that there is ambiguity in that involvement. This is where resistance, however marginal, finds its breeding ground (Ibid. 100-01).

	== Notes ==		== Notes ==

Geoffcox: /* Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter */

2023-07-22T12:09:49Z

Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter

← Older revision		Revision as of 12:09, 22 July 2023
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	= Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter =		= Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter =

	<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of ~~difference~~: Reading ~~blockchain through~~ the ~~decolonial thought~~ of Sylvia Wynter</span>		<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter</span>

	== Abstract ==		== Abstract ==

Geoffcox: /* Towards DAOs of difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter */

2023-07-22T12:06:16Z

Towards DAOs of difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter

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	__NOTOC__		__NOTOC__
	'''Inte Gloerich'''		'''Inte Gloerich'''
	= Towards DAOs of ~~difference~~: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter =		= Towards DAOs of Difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter =

	<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of difference: Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter</span>		<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of difference: Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter</span>

Geoffcox: /* Towards DAOs of difference:Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter */

2023-07-22T12:06:00Z

Towards DAOs of difference:Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter

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	__NOTOC__		__NOTOC__
	'''Inte Gloerich'''		'''Inte Gloerich'''
	= Towards DAOs of difference:~~<br>~~Reading ~~blockchain through~~ the ~~decolonial thought~~ of Sylvia Wynter =		= Towards DAOs of difference: Reading Blockchain Through the Decolonial Thought of Sylvia Wynter =

	<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of difference: Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter</span>		<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of difference: Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter</span>

Simoon at 10:29, 22 July 2023

2023-07-22T10:29:46Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:29, 22 July 2023
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	With this article, I explore the connections between blockchain technology, coloniality, and decolonial practices. Drawing on Sylvia Wynter’s thought on the interdependent systems of colonialism, capitalism, and knowledge, as well as more recent work on the coloniality of digital technologies, I argue that blockchain-based systems reproduce certain dynamics at work in historical colonialism. Additionally, Wynter’s decolonial propositions provide a generative framework to understand countercultural practices with. Inspired by Wynter, Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics. I apply this notion to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.		With this article, I explore the connections between blockchain technology, coloniality, and decolonial practices. Drawing on Sylvia Wynter’s thought on the interdependent systems of colonialism, capitalism, and knowledge, as well as more recent work on the coloniality of digital technologies, I argue that blockchain-based systems reproduce certain dynamics at work in historical colonialism. Additionally, Wynter’s decolonial propositions provide a generative framework to understand countercultural practices with. Inspired by Wynter, Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics. I apply this notion to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.

	~~<div class="page-break"></div>~~

	<blockquote>“Human beings are magical.” (Wynter ”The Pope must have been drunk” 35)</blockquote>		<blockquote>“Human beings are magical.” (Wynter ”The Pope must have been drunk” 35)</blockquote>

Simoon at 10:27, 22 July 2023

2023-07-22T10:27:48Z

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:27, 22 July 2023
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	With this article, I explore the connections between blockchain technology, coloniality, and decolonial practices. Drawing on Sylvia Wynter’s thought on the interdependent systems of colonialism, capitalism, and knowledge, as well as more recent work on the coloniality of digital technologies, I argue that blockchain-based systems reproduce certain dynamics at work in historical colonialism. Additionally, Wynter’s decolonial propositions provide a generative framework to understand countercultural practices with. Inspired by Wynter, Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics. I apply this notion to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.		With this article, I explore the connections between blockchain technology, coloniality, and decolonial practices. Drawing on Sylvia Wynter’s thought on the interdependent systems of colonialism, capitalism, and knowledge, as well as more recent work on the coloniality of digital technologies, I argue that blockchain-based systems reproduce certain dynamics at work in historical colonialism. Additionally, Wynter’s decolonial propositions provide a generative framework to understand countercultural practices with. Inspired by Wynter, Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics. I apply this notion to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.

			<div class="page-break"></div>

	<blockquote>“Human beings are magical.” (Wynter ”The Pope must have been drunk” 35)</blockquote>		<blockquote>“Human beings are magical.” (Wynter ”The Pope must have been drunk” 35)</blockquote>

Simoon at 20:33, 21 July 2023

2023-07-21T20:33:28Z

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	__NOTOC__		__NOTOC__
	~~= Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter =~~
	'''Inte Gloerich'''		'''Inte Gloerich'''
			= Towards DAOs of difference:<br>Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter =

			<span class="running-header">Towards DAOs of difference: Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter</span>

	== Abstract ==		== Abstract ==

Manetta: /* Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter */

2023-07-21T18:36:28Z

Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter

← Older revision		Revision as of 18:36, 21 July 2023
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	== Works cited ==		== Works cited ==
			<div class="workscited">
	“A Decentralized Collective of Mercenaries Ready to Slay Your Web3 Product Demons.” ''RaidGuild,'' n.d. https://www.raidguild.org/.		“A Decentralized Collective of Mercenaries Ready to Slay Your Web3 Product Demons.” ''RaidGuild,'' n.d. https://www.raidguild.org/.

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	Wynter, Sylvia, & Katherine McKittrick. “Unparalleled Catastrophy for Our Species? Or, to Give Humanness a Different Future: Conversations.” ''Sylvia Wynter: On Being Human as Praxis'', edited by Katherine McKittrick, Duke University Press, 2015, pp. 9–89.		Wynter, Sylvia, & Katherine McKittrick. “Unparalleled Catastrophy for Our Species? Or, to Give Humanness a Different Future: Conversations.” ''Sylvia Wynter: On Being Human as Praxis'', edited by Katherine McKittrick, Duke University Press, 2015, pp. 9–89.
			</div>

	[[Category:Toward a Minor Tech]]		[[Category:Toward a Minor Tech]]
	[[Category:5000 words]]		[[Category:5000 words]]

Simoon: /* Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter */

2023-07-17T14:33:13Z

Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter

← Older revision		Revision as of 14:33, 17 July 2023
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	Throughout the ebbs and flows of its hype cycles, blockchain technology continues to spark hope for a better future in mainstream as well as countercultural communities. This is possible because, in all its complexity, blockchain works as a floating signifier that represents very different opportunities to different people (Semenzin, 2021). To understand how and when blockchain technology and culture does or does not represent a radical break away from the status quo, I place it next to Sylvia Wynter’s theories on the way the history of colonialism and the continuing coloniality of power are intertwined with capitalism and its order of knowledge. I focus in particular on two dimensions in Wynter’s examination of colonialism: the relational and the epistemological. In the first, Wynter portrays the entangled history of colonial appropriation and exploitation of nature and human life and the emergence of global capitalist relations of extraction. In the second, Wynter shows how the extractions of capitalism are supported by a colonial order of knowledge that creates exploitable less-than-human Others. After relaying essential elements of Wynter’s theory, I relate both dimensions to contemporary blockchain practices and expand existing theories on their coloniality. I then return to Wynter's thoughts on decolonial practices in the interstices of the plantation called plots. These plots, are places in which non-extractive social relations may be practiced, but they are also narratives that provide different ways to understand life and what it means to live together. I draw on the work of artists and writers, such as Sarah Friend, Ruth Catlow and Penny Rafferty, who use blockchain technology in ways that echo Wynter’s decolonial propositions. Inspired by Wynter, researcher of socially engaged artistic practices Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics (de Vries n.p.). I apply the notion of plot work here to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.<ref>In applying the decolonial lens that Wynter offers, I want to acknowledge my own positionality. My experience as a white European person influenced the examples that I chose. In this sense, these examples enjoy their own privilege as well. Although I have experienced oppressive forces – e.g. in the form of sexism in the male-dominated field of technology – I do not know the oppressive effects of coloniality from my own experience. In educating myself through, among others, the work of Wynter, I hope to do justice to its complexities and contribute to revealing its continued influence in contemporary socio-technical systems.</ref> In what follows, I start each section with a quote by Sylvia Wynter, which I subsequently elaborate on and relate to the current blockchain space.		Throughout the ebbs and flows of its hype cycles, blockchain technology continues to spark hope for a better future in mainstream as well as countercultural communities. This is possible because, in all its complexity, blockchain works as a floating signifier that represents very different opportunities to different people (Semenzin, 2021). To understand how and when blockchain technology and culture does or does not represent a radical break away from the status quo, I place it next to Sylvia Wynter’s theories on the way the history of colonialism and the continuing coloniality of power are intertwined with capitalism and its order of knowledge. I focus in particular on two dimensions in Wynter’s examination of colonialism: the relational and the epistemological. In the first, Wynter portrays the entangled history of colonial appropriation and exploitation of nature and human life and the emergence of global capitalist relations of extraction. In the second, Wynter shows how the extractions of capitalism are supported by a colonial order of knowledge that creates exploitable less-than-human Others. After relaying essential elements of Wynter’s theory, I relate both dimensions to contemporary blockchain practices and expand existing theories on their coloniality. I then return to Wynter's thoughts on decolonial practices in the interstices of the plantation called plots. These plots, are places in which non-extractive social relations may be practiced, but they are also narratives that provide different ways to understand life and what it means to live together. I draw on the work of artists and writers, such as Sarah Friend, Ruth Catlow and Penny Rafferty, who use blockchain technology in ways that echo Wynter’s decolonial propositions. Inspired by Wynter, researcher of socially engaged artistic practices Patricia de Vries explores the notion of “plot work as artistic praxis” to ask how artistic work, implicated as it is in capitalist logics, can create space for relating differently in the context of the exploitations of those dominant logics (de Vries n.p.). I apply the notion of plot work here to examine how Decentralised Autonomous Organisations (DAOs) in the countercultural blockchain space might contribute to this praxis.<ref>In applying the decolonial lens that Wynter offers, I want to acknowledge my own positionality. My experience as a white European person influenced the examples that I chose. In this sense, these examples enjoy their own privilege as well. Although I have experienced oppressive forces – e.g. in the form of sexism in the male-dominated field of technology – I do not know the oppressive effects of coloniality from my own experience. In educating myself through, among others, the work of Wynter, I hope to do justice to its complexities and contribute to revealing its continued influence in contemporary socio-technical systems.</ref> In what follows, I start each section with a quote by Sylvia Wynter, which I subsequently elaborate on and relate to the current blockchain space.

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	== Historical colonialism and blockchain colonialism ==		== Historical colonialism and blockchain colonialism ==

Simoon at 13:13, 22 June 2023

2023-06-22T13:13:40Z

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	~~= Inte Gloerich =~~		__NOTOC__
	= Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter =		= Towards DAOs of difference. Reading blockchain through the decolonial thought of Sylvia Wynter =
			'''Inte Gloerich'''

	== Abstract ==		== Abstract ==