Abstract

This chapter deploys the notion of data fetishism to capture and unpack the centralising of computer-processed/generated large-scale data and its societal privileging over knowledge. The authors start by drawing on the most classical model in critical sociology – Marx’s idea of exploitation and fetishism – in order to construct a multi-dimensional model that allows for a better understanding of the phenomenon of data fetishism. At the same time, with this text, the authors aim to expand the more traditional approaches of critical sociology, and attempt a cross-fertilisation with another key approach to fetishism – namely Freud’s and Lacan’s theorisations – while being fully aware of the dilemmas related to such an effort.