A Maussian Bargain: The Give and Take of the Personal Data Economy

• In Event: Data and Markets: Devices, Practices and Representations - II

Abstract

The modern digital economy is built upon an implicit Faustian pact: companies provide online services for free, tempting us—like Faust—with universal knowledge at the tip of our keyboard; in return, users sign away access to traces of their lives. This peculiar kind of reciprocity, located somewhere between market and gift, does not align well with established economic forms. Relying on sociological and anthropological theory, we conceptualize it as the “Maussian bargain.” We draw on in-depth interviews with the designers and builders of these systems to explore the technical, political, economic and cultural conditions of this particular form of exchange, as well as the productive enrollment of personal data it has enabled, and on which 21st-century capitalism depends.

Authors

• Marion Fourcade, University of California, Berkeley Dept. of Sociology

• Daniel N Kluttz, University of California, Berkeley