This essay will show what are some of the qualifying characteristics of the theoretical construction of the law of the common. It will be divided into two parts. In the first part, I will review some of the main structural modifications that affected modern law with the advent of cognitive capitalism and digital platforms, in particular following the creation of the Internet of Things and cloud computing. In the second part, I will consider the pars construens of the law of the common, reflecting on the possibility of giving new conceptual meaning to the logic of appropriation and common property in the sense of it being inappropriable. In the end, I will propose that the inappropriability is an alternative to the conceptual duo of sovereignty and property.
Appropriation, Common Property, the Inappropriable: Notes on the Law of the Common in Platform Capitalism
Francesco Brancaccio has a doctorate in theory of the state and comparative political institutions from the Sapienza University of Rome. He is currently a doctoral student at the Graduate School of Social Sciences of the University of Paris 8, and his research focuses on urban commons. He is a member of the CEMTI and ATER (Attaché temporaire d’enseignement et de recherche) laboratories in the Department of Culture and Communication at the University of Paris 8. His recent publications include Il Comune come modo di produzione (The Common as Mode of Production, with Carlo Vercellone and others; 2017), the European research report DECODE Data-Driven Disruptive Commons-Based Models (with Carlo Vercellone and others; 2018), and the essay “Changer la ville. André Gorz et les communs urbains” (“Change the City: André Gorz and the Urban Commons” March 2019).
Francesco Brancaccio; Appropriation, Common Property, the Inappropriable: Notes on the Law of the Common in Platform Capitalism. South Atlantic Quarterly 1 October 2019; 118 (4): 857–876. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/00382876-7825660
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