From Social Abandonment to Algorithmic Abandonment: Digital Capitalism, Human Belonging, and the Capture of Human Identity

This preprint develops the concept of algorithmic abandonment as a critical and theoretical extension of social abandonment in contemporary digital society. It begins from Dr Cora M. Stack’s policy framework on loneliness, social abandonment, and Inclusive Community Belonging Hubs in Ireland, and uses Gretta Mohan’s ESRI-supported work on loneliness and mental health as an empirical Irish starting point. The paper argues that digital capitalism, platform life, automation, artificial intelligence, and algorithmic identity systems do not merely intensify loneliness; they reorganise the conditions of belonging by replacing embodied presence with mediated, personalised, and data-producing forms of connection. It introduces the Algorithmic Abandonment Cycle as a six-stage framework and connects it to the IAAP model: Identity in the Age of Algorithmic Power. The paper is conceptual and policy-oriented rather than empirical. It does not present new survey data, interviews, or clinical findings. Instead, it defines a new research problem, proposes operational indicators, develops future research propositions, and outlines policy principles for anti-abandonment and anti-capture design. Its central claim is that belonging should be treated as human infrastructure, and that digital tools should support embodied human connection rather than replace it.