Historian Jill Lepore: Silicon Valley’s Misreading of Science Fiction Threatens Democracy

BitcoinWorld Historian Jill Lepore: Silicon Valley’s Misreading of Science Fiction Threatens Democracy Harvard historian and New Yorker staff writer Jill Lepore warns that Silicon Valley’s growing influence over government functions marks a dangerous shift toward “rule by algorithms, corporations, machines,” a trend she explores in her upcoming book “The Rise and Fall of the Artificial State.” In a recent interview on Bitcoin World’s Equity podcast, Lepore argued that tech companies are increasingly replacing democratic institutions without public consent, a development she describes as “a return to tyranny and mystification.” What is the ‘Artificial State’?

Lepore defines the artificial state as a form of governance that replaces the liberal democratic nation-state, driven by private corporations and algorithmic systems.

She traces its intellectual origins to 19th-century notions of technological progress, which conflated evolution with social improvement.

“I’m not anti-technologist,” she clarified, “but my beef is the ways in which private corporations have increasingly taken on the functions of the state.” This shift, she argues, has been gradual and often accidental, but has become more deliberate in recent decades as tech leaders openly advocate moving beyond the nation-state.