The emergence of the synergistically complex power in digital era: challenges to human capital

Abstract

The article examines the dynamics of power in the context of the specifics of digital discourse from the industrial modernity up to the modern times. This is determined by the transition from one episteme of knowledge and thinking to another, the emergence of a network society, as well as digitalization processes. The author substantiates the claim that under the influence of these factors, the nature of power is permanently becoming more complex, acquiring an increasingly hybrid character amd also pays special attention to the analysis of the ambivalent consequences of the nonlinear transformations of power for the formation of human capital: on the one hand, newly created power resources are used for the benefit of people, however, like all complex innovation processes, the development of power is accompanied by unintentional “collateral damage” (Z. Bauman), which takes the form of challenges to irrational rationality, dehumanization, on which both those in power and the governed are forced to reflect, displaying their social responsibility. The factors contributing to the formation of a synergistically complex power are specifically revealed, including: speed, network realities, symbolic codes, “digital revolution” and “digital metamorphosis” (U. Beck). In conclusion, the author suggests some possible government responses to the challenges that have arisen: strengthening the social responsibility component of the human capital; taking into account the specifics of national realities, historical memory, and the established value realities in the life-worlds of Russians; the formation of “bridges” connecting peoples in line with the emergence of a multipolar world, with the aim to codevelop global and national-local human capital, sustainable development of the country and the world.