Three Approaches to Platform Studies: Cobweb, Billiard Balls, and Ant Societies

Digital media platforms are becoming increasingly subject to the sway of geopolitics, as seen during Russian invasion Ukraine and US-China trade war. How geopoliticized? What perspectives shall we use make sense process? This theoretical paper reformulates conceptual apparatuses liberalism, realism, constructivism, each represented by a metaphor: cobweb, billiard balls, ant societies, respectively. The approaches introduced, critiqued, compared understand platform geopoliticization more historically imaginatively on global well regional local scales. discussions propel studies be grounded multi-layered, concerning not only apex politico-economic power but also grassroots communal praxis, for example, metis. While pendulum is swinging from transnational capital nation-states, it insufficient restrict our thinking (neo)realism vis-à-vis (neo)liberalism. A moderate version constructivism—the “ant societies” model—hence needs articulation, which holds important methodological implications.