Ethical Economy within Digital Democracy

The most vibrant current thinking on the Digital Democracy is in a new book, The Ethical Economy by Nicolai Peitersen. Here, Peitersen argues that the information economy is split in two: the traditional capitalist economy – geared towards a continuous expansion which is neither environmentally nor socially sustainable, and a new non-monetary, “ethical economy”– the “production of the ideas, innovations, and experiences motivated by the wish to accumulate respect and recognition from that chosen community”.

Peitersen argues that the internet is an ideal infrastructure for autonomous forms of social production because it supports a multitude of practices, from e-commerce to e-religion, and what used to be private and restricted competences now become part of a globally available general intellect. This revolution is as important as the Renaissance or the Enlightenment as it can release us from corporate Consumer-capitalism. Peitersen predicts a scenario in which the ethical economy becomes the dominant system and capitalism functions as a sub-system, dealing mainly with the production and allocation of scarce, mostly material goods.

An Ethical Economy becomes the dominant system and capitalism functions as a sub-system.

The back cover of Funky Business, a popular management book, has this strap line “Karl Marx was right. The workers do control the most critical means of production. 1.3 kilograms of brain holds the key to all our futures”. Peitersen suggests that this quote fundamentally misunderstands the new Ethical Economy in assuming that the intellectual capital and relations in this new economy can in some way be “owned” by companies as a form of &quothuman capital&quot as defined by Adam Smith as the fourth form of capital after machines, buildings and land.

Publications such as Tom Peters The Brand Called You are a good example of this idea that one should engage with social networks in order to maximise one’s personal success and status rather than for other social reasons. This misses the point of things like Twitter or MySpace in which people experience community for its own sake.

Management theory seems only able to see the “free lunch” potential to commodify, appropriate and monetise Ethical Economy activity and misses the conflict between this new economy’s ideology and that of old style Consumer-capitalism. Peitersen points to today’s proliferation of new and alternative valuation systems; quoting Kevin Roberts, CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi, as an example of the hubris of the corporate world in saying “We have sophisticated metrics which capture Love and Respect”, Peitersen says: “As emerging as tools for aligning “shareholder value-creation and social value-creation’ they are virtually worthless.”

In fact this myopia risks a backlash as Peitersen says: “Savvy Consumers recognise their productive role in producing brand value and revolt against the brand owners whom they feel are exploiting them” and “there is an emerging consensus that these assets, or at least a growing share of them, are produced in processes that unfold beyond managerial control.

Consumers interact around a brand, knowledge workers organise their own work-process, bloggers generate reputation that spreads “virally” and so on.”

The Communications industry needs to take stock. In many ways this connectivity revolution allows Citizens to re-calibrate how they view the world.  Marketing men are being called to account by the legitimate and challenging grass-roots thinking from real people.

Marketing men are being called to account by the legitimate and challenging grass-roots thinking from real people.

We have examined the confluence of the seismic shifts of Climate Change, emerging Wellbeing, and Digital Democracy. In the next chapters, we examine the role Communications and marketing has played in these issues.

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