Quote from “No Secrets” by Raffi Katchadourian (The New Yorker, June 7, 2010)

 He had come to understand the defining human struggle not as left versus right, or faith versus reason, but as individual versus institution. As a student of Kafka, Koestler, and Solzhenitsyn, he believed that truth, creativity, love, and compassion are corrupted by institutional hierarchies, and by “patronage networks”—one of his favorite expressions—that contort the human spirit. He sketched out a manifesto of sorts, titled “Conspiracy as Governance,” which sought to apply graph theory to politics. Assange wrote that illegitimate governance was by definition conspiratorial—the product of functionaries in “collaborative secrecy, working to the detriment of a population.” He argued that, when a regime’s lines of internal communication are disrupted, the information flow among conspirators must dwindle, and that, as the flow approaches zero, the conspiracy dissolves. Leaks were an instrument of information warfare.

 The Wikileaks network is structured a great deal like the Internet itself, an information network with no center.  Because it has no center, it cannot be taken down as a whole, only in parts.  Like a creature with its brain spread out all over its body, cutting off its head will not kill it.

In the battle of individual versus institution, as Assange sees it, where do networks fit?  Even networks without reliance on a center?  Most of the readings and viewings this week show a dynamic tension between individuals, institutions, and networks.

 Some rights reserved by altemark (photo credit)