I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
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@ahltorp yeah, no. All the Heideggeresk arguments from just-so-etymology about which other German (sic!) words would be more correct to describe the same issue... This is just not it.
Meanwhile the rejection of this particular word obfuscates critiques of dimensions and domains of sovereignty itself, whom it applies to, if it can exist outside of the state and how it intersects with hegemonic practice. The kinds of things I find useful as a linguist and political scientist.
@jakob So basically, what you're saying is that since the post didn't analyse all aspects of the word, it should never have been posted?
Would I have accepted the post as an article in linguistics? No, but why should you apply those standards to a 450 character Mastodon post?
And where are these "Heideggeresk arguments from just-so-etymology about which other German (sic!) words would be more correct"? Not in the post you replied to, that's for sure.
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante I don’t see Resilience in the comments. Whether it is just that word or Regional / EU Resilience, enterprise risk folks often have part of their Resilience (BC/DR) based on geopolitical-risk metrics to avoid having critical supplies or functions reliant on scary places.
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@vintage_pizza @tante imagine thinking a toxified word doesn’t matter.
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@hadon @jwildeboer @tante I would say, autonomy, as the word part "auto" suggests, can apply to people and institutions on their own. You can have autonomy from X.
Sovereignty includes the word "reign". You can not reign without an object, you can have sovereignty over X.
As such, the two words are completely different in the way they describe a power struggle. Focus on autonomy and you describe a situation where you want to be free from something (e.g. Big Tech, or US tech, or whatever). Focus on sovereignty and you (and not someone else) should have power over something, typically via property, law, infrastructure involved.
I think both can still be used from a right-wing perspective of (EU) nationalism, but autonomy is more open to anarchist anti-capitalist principles.
But sovereignty seems appropriate since we are talking about not being dependent on another State. The idea is to not be dependent on American technologies (or defense)
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But sovereignty seems appropriate since we are talking about not being dependent on another State. The idea is to not be dependent on American technologies (or defense)
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Fascists will adopt whatever terms we use.
So, maybe we should always add, to every term, the word: "antifascist"
We want antifascist digital souvereignity.
@nilz @tante @jwildeboer This is why I love projects that use the .gay TLD. Built in antifascist naming scheme there.
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@tante yeah "digital agency" is where i've landed to describe what seems important there -- focusing on each being's ability to choose, understand, and shape their own digital presence (or lack thereof)
agree "digital sovereignty" has always seemed too nationalistic -- is good to work to disentangle from exploitative american tech structures, but "sovereignty" kinda gestures toward "...so we can build our own exploitative tech structures!"
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@larsmb I agree when it comes to terms that are useful/good (think Freedom). I'm not willing to fight for "sovereignty"
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante No, no, we all are sovereign and as we become more and more gloriously sovereign if it just so happens that this is exactly what allows the power-hungry extremists to take full control over everything and harm all the sovereign individuals, well, that is just a coincidence that no sovereign-minded citizen could have possibly foreseen.
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante Not everything what is called sovereign is from afd. It would be a good start, if they would be souvereign
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante and so if the AFD says they are proclaiming freedom we also stop using that word? 'Rechtsstaat' is bad, because fascists are 'rechts'? What is the plan here going forward?
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@tante I've, too, been concerned about "sovereignty" being too susceptible to nationalist capture. (Which is probably also why it appeals to certain parties despite often funding more progressive projects?)
I'm also in favor of a different term for the concept that is less so.
However, I also think that it sucks that we yield terms (which actually describes exactly what's intended) to the right-wing national so easily and then are forced to evade
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante would digital self-determination be better? but yeah, why is that term right wing coded? I'm not familiar with this issue
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I insist on calling it "Digital self-determination" for that and other reasons.
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante Did you mean that AfD is co-opting the term or that's the term digital sovereignty itself is originally conceived as a tool of right wing parties? At this point that the term digital sovereignty is pretty well embedded in the policy scene these days judging by my podcast feed.
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I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
Yes, but… I'm not prepared yet for a linguistic dance around all words, that might be used by the wrong people in a wrong meaning. It would feel like a Sisyphean task, because they occupy and abuse new words all the time.
But maybe we should use #digitalSovereignty for the state-level meaning, and e.g. #digitalAutonomy for collective and individual meaning? I used to use the first term for both, and that's blurring things.
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@vintage_pizza @tante imagine thinking a toxified word doesn’t matter.
@cascheranno @tante im not going to invent a new lexicon because some slobbering rightoid makes words sound scawwy. That’s some soft ass shit, these people literally want you dead
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@anna @beandreams @tante In what relates to the legal process of decolonisation, according to the UN “self determination” was often a necessary step: meaning giving a population a chance to determine whether they wanted full sovereignty or some form of autonomy within another nationstate. (The ILO developed further frameworks for decisions on economic development based on this one.)
But the phrase can be a bit confusing in the neoliberal era because of the word “self” which in this context isn’t individual at all.
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But sovereignty seems appropriate since we are talking about not being dependent on another State. The idea is to not be dependent on American technologies (or defense)
@hadon @skaphle @jwildeboer @tante
I'm always talking about not being dependent on corporations. American, european, whatever. My "we" is always people, proletarians, never a nation. -
I have been warning about the term "digital sovereignty" and how it is right-wing coded and probably can't be salvaged for non-right-wing politics.
The German fascist party AfD now created a European foundation to push their fascist politics further. The name: "Sovereignty Foundation".
Even though tactically it might feel like it makes sense to use the term to get funding, you are integrating right wing politics into your thinking and speaking.
@tante it's important that information used by your government is held on servers that come under your government's jurisdiction. This is information about taxes, justice, socialized health care etc. Without that another regime can take control of it in ways you don't like and you can't, for example vote them out of office cos it isn't a country you have a vote in.
But another meaning of digital sovereignty is more personal. It's important that, where possible, your own data (eg family photos) is held on machines you control. This prevents other people using it in ways you don't like.
Neither of these requirements is specifically right wing, though right wing people may want them just like the rest of us.
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