Politics and Bitcoin: The Worldviews of Upcoming Schools of Thought 🚨 This article is 6 years old...
Politics and Bitcoin: The Worldviews of Upcoming Schools of Thought
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Updated: Apr. 18, 2022 at 5:57 pm UTC
Photo by Sam Headland on Unsplash
Socio-politics find their way into every substantial development, and cryptocurrencies have not been spared. Political scholars have weighed in about digital assets being predominantly rightist in nature, while others argue that the technology is wholly apolitical.
Bitcoin and Libertarianism
Since its inception, the broader cryptocurrency community has drawn parallels between Bitcoin and libertarianism, and there are clear reasons for doing so: Both of their inherent ideologies favor a governance interference-free system that propels the “be your own boss” school of thought.
The Hill has attempted to understand the political inclinations of crypto projects, the underlying technology and the community as a whole. Surprisingly, they discovered a lack of research on the political preferences of project developers and leaders, meaning most of the libertarian views were mere rumors.
Citing research spanning 1,200 crypto-enthusiasts, the publication discovered only 24 percent of the respondents identified as a libertarian, 21 percent as conservatives, 9 percent as socialists, 8 percent as anarcho-capitalists and 3 percent as nihilists. The largest demographic was occupied by liberals at 27 percent.
In a broader sense, the percentages can count as distinctive worldviews of cryptocurrency users, indicating their support of cryptocurrencies with a preference for the various types of government.
The Question of Right or Left?
Combining the percentages, over 52 percent of respondents identify as right-wing, with the remaining on the left.
The right’s edge over a substantial minority implies political choices have a limited role to play in one’s choice of adopting cryptocurrencies. Two parameters can be considered paramount to explain this aspect–the amount of time in crypto and loyalty toward a particular digital asset.
As per research, libertarians are said to be among early cryptocurrency adopters due to the ethos of Bitcoin. However, the market’s price movements and publicized success stories have undoubtedly attracted people to the crypto world regardless of their political views.
The research also that noted 55 percent of test-takers actively followed cryptocurrencies after 2017, a year of incredible asset growth and money flow.
Individual Communities Vary in Political Views
Respondent ideologies across cryptocurrencies vary greatly. For example, Bitcoin has a political following closely resembling test results, Ethereum is 55 percent leftist and privacy-centric Dash is 78 percent rightist.
Interestingly, Monero has extreme values for both right and left. It is also populated with the highest percentage of anarcho-capitalists at 36 percent.
While cryptocurrencies are regarded as pioneers of the “Fourth Industrial Revolution,” a group that includes blockchain technology, IoT and artificial intelligence. Based on the research, a unique aspect of this technological move can be ascertained–the makers of the future have substantially different political views than current leaders.
The cryptocurrency sector could very likely split between various level of animosity, with each community having distinct political views.
