Peer production in an integral and intersubjective framework

By Stephen Downes - Stephen's Web. Peer production in an integral and intersubjective framework
Michel Bauwens, Integral World, 2016/08/10

There's a lot that's interesting in this paper and yet I think the most interesting work is in the first section where P2P (peer-to-peer) is defined. In the second section and thereafter we get into a type of metaphysics that doesn't interest me (but is of great interest to critical theorists). Just more taxonomy. But learning, inference and discovery are not states, as a taxonomic approach would suggest; they are processes. The third section looks at "intersubjective modes", which is more interesting, but I find it conflates between markets, which require a measurement system, and networks, in which only structure is important (there's a bit of a back and forth on whether reciprocity is required, without which of course markets can't exist). So, ultimately, can P2P be a "mode of production"? Maybe, but "participants cannot live from peer production, though they derive meaning and value from it, and though it may out compete, in efficiency and productivity terms, the market-based for-profit alternatives."

It's worth noting the parallel between this and the thesis in Patrick Watson's The Struggle for Democracy, which is essentially that democracy presupposes wealth.

• The Struggle For Democracy - Genesis
• The Struggle For Democracy - Reborn In America
• The Struggle For Democracy - Chiefs and Strongmen
• The Struggle For Democracy - The Tyrrany Of The Majority
• The Struggle For Democracy - The Rule Of Law
• The Struggle For Democracy - The Last Citizens
• The Struggle For Democracy - The First Freedom
• The Struggle For Democracy - The Price Of Democracy
• The Struggle For Democracy - A Soldiers Duty
• The Struggle For Democracy - Whither Democracy
• The Struggle For Democracy - Reflections On The French
• The Struggle For Democracy - The Curtain Rises. More...