It has become commonplace to be in the same physical location as your family, friends, and coworkers, but they will all be absorbed in their phone screens, scrolling, laughing, and exclaiming the wows as they wallow into individual virtual spaces. Welcome to the new world order of dopamine capitalism.

The rise of dopamine capitalism emerged from the convergence of technological advancements and psychological insights of the late 20th and 21st centuries.  It coincided with the dominance of tech giants such as Meta, Amazon, and ByteDance, whose business models rely on capturing attention and monetizing user data.

The dopamine effect is the release of dopamine to the brain’s reward centers in response to pleasurable and novel stimuli. The digital revolution has scaled up the ability to exploit the brain reward systems to generate profit, engineer addictive behavior and program humans into robots.

Dopamine capitalism refers to an economic model where technology platforms exploit the neuroscientific reward mechanisms using primarily dopamine-driven feedback loops to maximize user engagement and profitability. It operates through several interconnected mechanisms namely addictive design, that use features such as infinite scroll, autoplay; personalized algorithms that analyze data to deliver hyper targeted content optimizing on relevance and engagement; gamification apps with game like elements and instant gratification such as on e-commerce platform that offer one click and same day deliveries.

Dopamine, the neurotransmitter linked to pleasure and reinforcement learning, is leveraged by social media, gaming and Artificial Intelligence driven platforms to foster addictive engagements. It relies on variable rewards such as likes and notifications; personalized algorithms such as Tik Tok’s for You Page; and gamification such as streaks and badges.

Strategic utilization of the “dopamine effect” is not a new phenomenon. Religions and cultural beliefs have utilized it to program humans. In geopolitics, big powers have used development aid programs, cultural exports, movies and media to condition perceptions and manipulate behavior in less developed countries. The marketing space is shifting from the traditional promotion of products and services by informing and persuasion to build brand loyalty, to leveraging technology and data to psychologically manipulate human behavior at subconscious and emotional levels.

The Inter Region Economic Network (IREN Kenya), and dopamine capitalism both recognize the mind’s centrality for transformation. The big difference is the intent or incentives, where dopamine capitalism has a trap effect that reduces possibilities deep thinking and promotes fragmented attention span. The manipulative aspect of technologically accelerated dopamine capitalism places a huge strain on the IREN Kenya philosophy that “A free human mind is the ultimate capital.”

The IREN Kenya think tank’s philosophy champions creative minds, entrepreneurship and innovation as the most important resource for development in Africa. The tensions between addictive and programmed people versus human mental freedoms raises critical questions on human choice, democracy, and mental health crises. In the past, capitalism used people's freedom of choice to make them want things they don't need. Dopamine capitalism on the other hand is getting us all addicted to satiating the pleasurable part of our brains.

In the African context, deeper research on how this new form of capitalism is likely to drive Artificial Intelligence driven colonialism needs to be explored in depth. In social and interpersonal relations, a deeper analysis on addiction rates, number of hours spent on social media platforms and the implications to the future of people as social beings is vital. Parenting in this era of “kidinfluencers” is another critical area that requires urgent attention, not only for mental health related issues but for the future of family and child upbringing.

Dopamine capitalism challenges IREN Kenya’s core philosophy and has incentivized the call for policy makers and governments to facilitate clear mandates for dopamine transparency that ensure platforms disclose addictive features.  Clear government policies and guidelines are required to enable humanity to grow its immunity against algorithmic manipulation through intentional and proactive digital literacy.

African neuroscientists are strongly urged to take the initiative and guarantee involvement in morally sound designs that are based on the continent's lengthy history of exploitation, which has always been fueled by cutting-edge technology.

By James Shikwati

Founder Director of IREN Kenya and Publisher of The African Executive weekly magazine. james@irenkenya.com