GEOPOLITICAL MYTH IN THE AGE OF ALGORITHMS: THE TRANSFORMATION OF THE SYMBOLIC UNDER THE INFLUENCE OF DIGITAL PLATFORMS
Abstract
The article offers a philosophical and methodological reconstruction of geopolitical myth as an effect of the network of interactions between algorithms, digital platforms, and users. It proposes moving from the classical model of a sovereign myth-maker to an actor-network ontology in which the algorithm appears as a full-fledged actor in the production of the symbolic. The theoretical framework integrates several lines: symbolic form in Cassirer, second-order semiology in Barthes, code and model-reader theory in Eco, discursive formation and power-knowledge in Foucault, affective circulation in Ahmed and pre-personal affect in Massumi, actor-network theory by Latour, Callon, and Law. All these layers are integrated into a single analytical framework in which myth does not precede the network but condenses within it. On this ground, the article analyzes three platform regimes of geopolitical myth circulation. TikTok constitutes a regime of myth-condensation through algorithmic acceleration: the For You Page selects forms that maximize attention retention, and the very form of the micro-video becomes the carrier of the affective core. YouTube constitutes a regime of stabilization: the recommendation architecture systematically moves the user deeper into already-captured narrative trajectories, condensing myth into the form of the “commonly known.” Telegram functions as a regime of incubation: dense networks of mutual forwarding generate affective resonance within a semi-closed environment. Geopolitical myth in the digital age is not produced by a centralized subject – it is a structural effect of visibility infrastructures that systematically raise the stakes of affectively loaded, rhythmically coupled formats. The article proposes to rethink power in terms of algorithmic management of visibility, and authorship as a distributed position between human, bot, and generative model. Practical consequences follow for critical analysis: instead of fact-checking narrative content – reconstruction of network couplings that hold this narrative together; instead of exposing “false consciousness” – analysis of the infrastructures in which this consciousness is continuously reshaped.
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