Governare il comportamento. Le radici comportamentiste del capitalismo digitale

The economy of digital capitalism is based on extraction, profiling and manipulation of behaviour. The logic of this system is not entirely new: it is based on the assumptions of behaviourism, particularly in its Skinnerian version. The economics of behavioural surplus is indebted to Skinnerian psychology both in terms of its philosophical approach and because it exploits behavioural technologies developed by the American scientist in his experiments. Interpreting digital capitalism in the light of radical behaviourism puts the notion of behaviour at the centre and provides a critical perspective on both epistemological assumptions and the pathologizing effects of algorithms.