Black Box - English version

The Mar-a-Lago accord is a hypothetical project that both Trumpian economists and outside observers are following closely. It is bound to be an ambitious new direction for the international economic equilibrium, and certain to affect the following four years – for good or for ill. A combination of deregulation, tax cuts, devaluation, and tariffs. Should it succeed, it will lead to the highest point ever seen by the American dollar, followed by a slow and constant decline – by design of the USA, and in accordance with the rest of the world.

The rise of Artificial Intelligence brings to mind the fear of an apocalypse. In one of these dystopian predictions, thinking machines will take over the giant maze of bureaucracy at the core of modern society. In this scenario, AI will be tasked with deciding if and how to give out a mortgage, the order of priority for an operation, and the length of a prison sentence. In a hyper-technological version of Franz Kafka's The Trial, the real predators to fear would be Them: the digital bureaucrats.

It’s 2.42 PM on May 6 2010. Navinder Sarao, a thirty-two year old British Indian and self-taught trader, plunges Wall Street into chaos. In just a few minutes, 750 billion euros disappear from the financial markets. All screens go black. It’s the stop logic function, put in place to avoid prices from crashing. After five long seconds, the orders slowly start up again, and the money reappears as well. But Sarao was able to take advantage of what will become known as the “flash crash”, and for a few moments human ingenuity managed to trump the domination of algorithms and models.

They’re called “inner areas”, they’re the spaces of a deep Italy, which have been kept far away from public debate for too long, without public investment and services, forced to a drastic fall in habitability, ever more subject to climate change and environmental disasters. They make up 60% of the national territory, almost fifteen million people live here; they make up a consistent portion of GDP and they’re home to quality manufacturing districts. And this is exactly where the idea for an Italy of the future needs to start from.

When we talk about drugs, we also have to talk about economics and urban spaces, about repressive policies and laws. We have to talk about poverty and the lack of prospects. About inefficiency, about markets, about capital and the laws of offer and demand. Drugs open and close each phase, from the heroin epidemic of the seventies to the current opioid crisis, which is destroying the heartland of America. Drugs are the one perfect good that can never be overproduced, and the one market that never creates a bubble. In short, they’re secretly a capitalist’s dream.