Domination Patterns in the Digital Era

The research develops a theoretical reflection on the possible and actual domination pat- terns emerging from the digital turn of the media system. The digital media environment is assessed as the new public sphere, where the risk of audience manipulation is emphasized by the massive fru- ition and consumption of mostly visual contents on social media, that became primary news’ sources. The dependence of the whole news media system on the social media agenda causes the downward levelling of information accuracy and the potential emergence of fake news, spreading polarizing narratives: this all configures a form of domination exercised by social media, but it is not the only one. A contemporary version of cultural aggression theorized by Arnold J. Toynbee is also proposed, and the so-called “invisible social control” held by Big Tech within the platform capitalism emerges as a very distinctive pattern of domination in contemporaneity.