Algorithmic Disciplines. How Algorithms Make and Unmake History

Abstract

The essay discusses the algorithmic temporal regime, starting with an exploration of Bruno Latour's theory and its critics, to elaborate an understanding of technology as not only an operational but also an ideological construct. The essay traces the conceptual history of algorithmic calculation back to its roots in cybernetics and an older history of social quantification, allowing for consideration of how algorithms redefine the logic and direction of administrative intervention. Through algorithms, administration is structured on a "retroactive design," where the future is brought into the present to automate past behaviors. This algorithmic discipline merges with neoliberal individualization processes, outlining the features of an automated moral economy.