AI as Anti-Politics: Daniel Stanley on Technopopulism, Data, and Rebuilding Collective Power

Enroll at AHRC:  https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-courses

Is AI really the threat to democracy we've been told it is, or is it just democracy's own rot wearing a new face? Daniel Stanley of the Future Narratives Lab joins us to unpack his essay "AI as Anti-Politics," arguing the technology isn't an external assault on democratic life but the product of decades of shifts that already hollowed out collective political power. We explore technopopulism and ask what it would take to rebuild institutions capable of pushing back against extraction. Also in the discussion: data as a collective resource, the revival of interest in social clubs and in-person organizing, and why funding these new institutions might be the most difficult problem of all.

Future Narratives Lab: https://www.futurenarrativeslab.org/

Dan's paper: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jkxy_QPKk_W_yg4uanXx17Qnyka6ry-x/view?usp=sharing

Support LEPHT HAND:

Join the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/LEPHTHAND

Emma's Substack: https://elftheory.substack.com/

Sereptie's Substack: https://splitinfinities.substack.com/

Merch and Design Shop: crit-drip.com

Acid Horizon Links: https://linktr.ee/acidhorizon

Sereptie (ambient project): https://sereptie.bandcamp.com/

Acid Horizon Research Commons is now live: https://www.acidhorizonpodcast.com/ahrc-main