CDSMS MICKY LEE BUBBLES AND MACHINES Gender, Information and Financial Crises 1 0010100000 0110110101101101001101101011101000 1001 01100101011 0 0101110111 1101001100100001111001000000110001101100 101000111011101101110011 11 01100011100 000000101100110111 11101001 100011010010 11011 00001000001110110110111111001100100001100 1011101 100011000001100 100000010011010110 1101101 0000010000000000000100000001000 110011 11010111010101 00111011 111 011010 111000110011000110010101110011001000000110000 01001011100110010000001100001001010 1 0 1100001000000 100 01100 1001000010000 00000000 0 1010011 10111000000101111010 01011011101001011010 110111001101101111011 011011111 011000011100000000000 110010101111001011100101011 1010001100100011001010011 001010100111111011010000011 0001101 010001 001101 11001100000010101101100111111 110011000010110001 000000101110100010 0000110110100001110001111100111 0000011000010110111001100101011000001011011100 10001100011 001100101 000000011000 001101010 1011100110001110011001 000000 0101100011111000001111100 000001011011000010011100110110000100110110000100 01010000000000 0000100100100000 00010 110001111 00001111101011001011111001011 0100110111110011101 11110000010110000011 00000001110001101100101 110000000110011111100001010 101110100101110100000001111 100011111111001100110011010000 00011001 00010110100000000101110111011 1 1010110100000011001110101010010110 101110011011100101111 01 1000100100001110111110111 111100001010110101011111010 001011000001011000010000001000 000010000010000000010100 1101110010011011010111 011100110100110111011011 100110 1110110111000100000011000111110110111100000010000010 00000 0 0000000100011001101001011010000000100001000100 0111001 00110100 0010 011 111000001100011001100 100110101 00101000010010110000101101011001 00000 110 0111001001101001011100110101111010010010011010 00 10101 1000010110 11100 01 Bubbles and Machines: Gender, Information and Financial Crises Micky Lee Critical, Digital and Social Media Studies Series Editor: Christian Fuchs The peer-reviewed book series edited by Christian Fuchs publishes books that critically study the role of the internet and digital and social media in society. Titles analyse how power structures, digital capitalism, ideology and social struggles shape and are shaped by digital and social media. They use and develop critical theory discussing thepolitical relevance and implications of studied topics. The series is a theoretical forum for internet and social media research for books using methods and theories that challenge digital positivism; it also seeks to explore digital media ethics grounded in critical social theories and philosophy. Editorial Board Thomas Allmer, Mark Andrejevic, Miriyam Aouragh, Charles Brown, Eran Fisher, Peter Goodwin, Jonathan Hardy, Kylie Jarrett, Anastasia Kavada, Maria Michalis, Stefania Milan, Vincent Mosco, Jack Qiu, Jernej Amon Prodnik, Marisol Sandoval, Sebastian Sevignani, Pieter Verdegem Published Critical Theory of Communication: New Readings of Lukács, Adorno, Marcuse, Honneth and Habermas in the Age of the Internet Christian Fuchs https://doi.org/10.16997/book1 Knowledge in the Age of Digital Capitalism: An Introduction to Cognitive Materialism Mariano Zukerfeld https://doi.org/10.16997/book3 Politicizing Digital Space: Theory, the Internet, and Renewing Democracy Trevor Garrison Smith https://doi.org/10.16997/book5 Capital, State, Empire: The New American Way of Digital Warfare Scott Timcke https://doi.org/10.16997/book6 The Spectacle 2.0: Reading Debord in the Context of Digital Capitalism Edited by Marco Briziarelli and Emiliana Armano https://doi.org/10.16997/book11 The Big Data Agenda: Data Ethics and Critical Data Studies Annika Richterich https://doi.org/10.16997/book14 Social Capital Online: Alienation and Accumulation Kane X. Faucher https://doi.org/10.16997/book16 The Propaganda Model Today: Filtering Perception and Awareness Edited by Joan Pedro-Carañana, Daniel Broudy and Jeffery Klaehn https://doi.org/10.16997/book27 Critical Theory and Authoritarian Populism Edited by Jeremiah Morelock https://doi.org/10.16997/book30 Peer to Peer: The Commons Manifesto Michel Bauwens, Vasilis Kostakis, and Alex Pazaitis https://doi.org/10.16997/book33 Bubbles and Machines: Gender, Information and Financial Crises Micky Lee University of Westminster Press www.uwestminsterpress.co.uk Published by University of Westminster Press 115 New Cavendish Street London W1W 6UW www.uwestminsterpress.co.uk Text © Micky Lee 2019 First published 2019 Cover design: www.ketchup-productions.co.uk Series cover concept: Mina Bach (minabach.co.uk) Print and digital versions typeset by Siliconchips Services Ltd. ISBN (Paperback): 978-1-912656-00-4 ISBN (PDF): 978-1-912656-01-1 ISBN (EPUB): 978-1-912656-02-8 ISBN (Kindle): 978-1-978-1-912656-03-5 DOI: https://doi.org/10.16997/book34 This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial- NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 444 Castro Street, Suite 900, Mountain View, California, 94041, USA. This license allows for copying and distributing the work, provid ing author attribution is clearly stated, that you are not using the material for commercial purposes, and that modified versions are not distributed. The full text of this book has been peer-reviewed to ensure high academic standards. For full review policies, see: http://www.uwestminsterpress.co.uk/ site/publish. Competing interests: The authors have no competing interests to declare. Suggested citation: Lee, M. 2019 Bubbles and Machines: Gender, Information and Financial Crises London: University of Westminster Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.16997/book34 License: CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0 To read the free, open access version of this book online, visit https://doi.org/10.16997/ book34 or scan this QR code with your mobile device: Contents 1. Introduction: Bubbles and Machines 1 2. Tulipomania: Unchanging Gender Relations in Financial Capitalism 29 3. The Indebted Women: Microcredit and the Credit Card 55 4. Financial Information Reporting in the Earliest Wall Street 93 5. The Screen, Financial Information and Market Locale 107 6. Conclusion 131 Bibliography 137 Filmography and Television 149 Index 151 CHAPTER 1 Introduction: Bubbles and Machines Bubbles: elusive, temporary, and illusory. Machines: rational, concrete, and useful. The definition of an economic bubble appears to be very straightforward: it is ‘a market phenomenon characterised by surges in asset prices to levels sig- nificantly above the fundamental value of the asset.’1 The word ‘phenomenon’ assumes that an economic bubble is a temporary problem that can be solved and hopefully prevented in the future. The definition implies that the difference between the asset price and the fundamental value can be known if there is a better formula. An accurate calculation would require better machines. Better machines would control bubbles. In a financial crisis, bubbles are the feminine; machines are the masculine. Crisis is said to be a temperamental moment in a largely stable market, an irra- tional moment in a mostly rational market. The term ‘irrational exuberance’— first coined by Alan Greenspan (former chairperson of the US Federal Reserve) and later adopted by Yale economist Robert Shiller (2000) as a book title— pointed to the herds of investors who drive up asset price above the fundamen- tal price. An irrational market is seen to be lacking control, a party that has gone wild. To prevent the market from behaving irrationally, machines are invented to perfect the market. There are machines to report stock prices, machines to communicate between buyers and sellers, and machines to predict the market. Few have asked: can machines be irrational? Can technology do things out of intention? Will irrational machines produce information that leads to financial bubbles? In other words, are financial crises embedded in information tech- nology? If irrational markets are inevitable outcomes of presumably rational machines, then how can we understand the gender discourse of financial infor- mation and financial crises? How to cite this book chapter: Lee, M. 2019. Bubbles and Machines: Gender, Information and Financial Crises. Pp. 1–27. London: University of Westminster Press. DOI: https://doi.org/10.16997/book34.a. License: CC‐BY‐NC‐ND 4.0 2 Bubbles and Machines These questions may not make immediate sense, but this book aims to make sense of them. I answer the questions by discussing and illustrating how femi- nist political economic theories and Actor-Network Theory (ANT) of Science and Technology Studies (STS) enrich a political economic critique of financial crises. I argue that a critical political economic approach to communication is the most promising to understand financial crises because it takes into ac- count the capitalist context in which crises occur and because it historicises technology and economy. Current political economic writings on financial crises have however neglected two areas: first, the gendered nature and gender ideology of finance capital. Not only are women used as resources to facili- tate the flow of capital to and through financial markets, but gender is also made flexible to accommodate the flow. Second, financial information and finance capital are materially and technologically embedded. The materiality of financial technologies gives a qualitative property to financial information and finance capital,