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  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Epic Fail: How Hacktivists Expose Democracy's Flaws

Epic Fail: How Hacktivists Expose Democracy's Flaws

Gorham, Ashley E.

Paperback

Series: Information Policy

Technology & EngineeringGeneral Political Science

PREORDER - Expected ship date November 10, 2026

ISBN10: 0262056429
ISBN13: 9780262056427
Publisher: MIT Press
Published: Nov 10 2026
Pages: 230
Language: English
A provocative and clear-eyed exploration of hacktivism as a democratic practice.

In 1998, the early hacktivist group Electronic Disturbance Theater (EDT) burst onto the world stage with their virtual sit-in in support of the Zapatistas' struggle against neoliberalism in Mexico, but by the time WikiLeaks and Anonymous made their own headlines in the 2010s, they were all but forgotten by the public. As all three groups begin to recede into the past, we are left with the question of the efficacy of hacktivism.

In Epic Fail, Ashley Gorham uses democratic theory to unpack this question by examining these three especially prominent hacktivist groups. While each is shown to have its own bug or fail, failure itself is rehabilitated as an inevitable component of all democratic action, which serves as both warning and inspiration for future democratic theorists and actors alike. The book enriches our understanding not only of hacktivism but also of democratic theory as the groups' bugs highlight problems within the individual theories discussed--epistemic and radical democracy.

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