Technological Capture

Technological capture is the distinctive capture risk of digital-age institutions. It operates through the dependence of institutional functioning on technological infrastructure that is governed according to principles other than the institution's own constitutional principles. As Volume III's analysis of the platform-versus-protocol distinction established, institutions whose core functions depend on platforms controlled by others are institutionally captured by those platforms' governance decisions.

The design responses are continuous with Volume III's technological architecture: Providence's core functions must operate on infrastructure that is governed according to its own constitutional principles, not on platforms controlled by external actors. This requires investment in common infrastructure — the identity layer, the trust layer, the coordination protocols — that is governed as part of the commons rather than provided as a service by external platforms. It also requires explicit policies about the use of external platforms for functions that are not core, with explicit evaluation of whether any particular external dependency creates governance vulnerabilities that are inconsistent with the constitutional principles.