The Power of Technology and the Technologies of Power

This paper will try to address the nature of the WikiLeaks phenomenon, and its implications. It will attempt to throw light on WikiLeaks as idea, institution, practice and imaginary. In doing so, it will also assess a broad set of question that have been raised in relation to it: what it might mean for the state, what it could mean for dissent, political activism and democracy, and what it means for journalism. I will try to show that these three sets of concern are, ultimately, interconnected and hinge both on the nature of the medium of WikiLeaks, and the nature of the materials posted. This understanding of the WikiLeaks phenomenon and its importance then needs to be sought in/at the intersection of the technological form, (and the power it makes available for shifting social boundaries of knowledge and action), with the substance of the leaks that have been produced, regardless of the various speculations about what agendas might have been behind the leaks in the first place.