Algorithmic Realism vs. the Matters of Law

Research output: Contribution to journalSpecial issuepeer-review

Abstract


Prospects of “rationalisation” accompanying the "algorithmic turn" - promising an hyper-agile automatic (algorithmic) governance of the social in high resolution/dissolution at the pre-semiotic scale of the digital data -resurrects the revolutionary utopia of a full transparency of the social emancipated from the yokes of representation, language, images, perspectives. As such, “algorithmic realism” appears at odd with the “matters of law”: a linguistic sedimentation of codes and interpretations in a culture of interpretable signs and readable texts. But there are also other “materialities” that are obliterated by algorithmic realism: the space-time of political and legal individuation or subjectivation. Drawing on Louis Althusser and Catherine Malabou, this contribution distances itself from mainstream “retro-critique” of algorithmic biases, lack or transparency and accountability – which are much in line with traditional critique of representation – and rather base its arguments against algorithmic jurisprudence on the heterochronicity and relational ontology (“materialism of encounter”) of the legal and political subject, taking Mark Fisher’s invitation seriously: « We need to build critique from a future that hasn’t arise. »
Original languageEnglish
JournalLaw and Critique
Publication statusIn preparation - 2023

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