Money Code Space: Hidden Power in Bitcoin, Blockchain, and Decentralisation (Oxford Studies in Digital Politics) - Hardcover

Parkin, Jack

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 019751507X ISBN 13: 9780197515075

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2020

Synopsis

Following the catastrophic events of the 2008 global financial crisis, an anonymous hacker released Bitcoin to claw back power from commercial and central banks. It quickly garnered an enthusiastic following who sought to forge a stable and democratic global economy--a world free from hierarchy and control. In their eyes, Bitcoin's underlying architecture, blockchain, hailed the dawn of decentralisation.

Money Code Space shatters these emancipatory claims. In their place, Jack Parkin constructs a new framework for revealing the geographies of power that lie behind blockchain networks. Drawing on first-hand experience in cryptocurrency communities and start-up companies from Silicon Valley to London, Parkin untangles the complex web of culture, politics, and economics that truly drive decentralisation.

About this title

About the Author

Jack Parkin is an Adjunct Fellow at the Institute for Culture and Society, Western Sydney University, where he researches the political economy of cryptocurrency and blockchain ecosystems. His ethnographic work focuses on points of control in digital networks, analysing software development models, technical infrastructure, and start-up industries. He also provides consultancy services for automation and distributed ledger solutions internationally.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 019751507X
• ISBN 13: 9780197515075
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 304