Platform Capitalism, Platform Cooperativism, and the Commons

Abstract

This essay explores the potential for transitioning from platform capitalism to a commons-oriented postcapitalist ethical economy. Platform capitalism is an “updated” version of capitalism advanced by online software platforms. Trebor Scholz juxtaposes platform cooperativism with platform capitalism, aiming to outdo the latter by means of communal ownership, democratic governance, and the equitable distribution of value. Bauwens and Kostakis criticize platform cooperativism as insufficient insofar as it operates under a closed copyright system. They argue instead for incorporating platform cooperativism into a broader model of open cooperativism, premised on the principles of commons-based peer production. The essay concludes with a critical appraisal of Bauwens and Kostakis’s model of open cooperativism.

Key Words:

• Commons
• Open Cooperativism
• Platform Capitalism
• Platform Cooperativism
• Postcapitalism

Notes

1 For more, see “#PlatformCoop Directory,” Internet of Ownership website, accessed 19 December 2020, https://ioo.coop/directory.

2 See “Stocksy,” P2P Foundation Wiki, last modified 28 July 2016, https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/Stocksy.

3 See “Case Study: Fairmondo,” Commons Transition Primer website, accessed 19 December 2020, https://primer.commonstransition.org/4-more/5-elements/case-studies/case-study-fairmondo.

4 See “CopyFair License,” P2P Foundation Wiki, last modified 2 April 2020, https://wiki.p2pfoundation.net/CopyFair_License.

5 Some prominent examples are the Catalonian Integral Cooperative or CIC (Catalonia, Spain), the Mutual Aid Network (Madison, Wisconsin), and Enspiral (New Zealand). See Bauwens et al. 2017, 14–15).

6 Some showcases of the DG-ML model are AbilityMate, WikiHouse, RepRap, OSVehicle, FarmHack, Open Source Ecology, L’Atelier Paysan, and Bionics (Kostakis et al. 2015; Giotitsas and Ramos 2017; Papadimitropoulos 2017).

7 See “Case Study: WikiHouse,” Commons Transition Primer website, accessed 19 December 2020, https://primer.commonstransition.org/4-more/5-elements/case-studies/case-study-wikihouse.