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From clay tablets to the algorithmic state, this groundbreaking 11,000 year history argues that information has always been the seed of power. Perfect for readers of Nexus and The Age of Surveillance Capitalism.

Long before writing existed, at the dawn of civilisation in Mesopotamia, rulers pressed marks into clay to keep track of land, people and grain. To rule, they had to keep count. It is no accident, then, that the first written name in human history was neither a god nor a king, but an accountant.

As ships and navigation expanded our horizons, a new age of European empires took control of more than 80 per cent of the world’s surface, using censuses, maps and ledgers to decide who belonged, who owed, and who could be sacrificed. Today, we live in the third great era, when trading our information for access can feel harmless or inevitable – yet from targeted advertising to border policing and mass surveillance, data shapes the course of our lives.

Drawing on stories from ancient cave markings and knotted strings to colonial record-keeping and the algorithmic state, Data Empire reveals how data has always been the seed of power: a technology of control that has shaped civilizations and upheld empires. Provocative, humane and sweeping in scope, it asks us to recognise the power data has always held – and to imagine what resistance looks like in an age defined by it, so that we might remake the modern world for the benefit of all.

© Roopika Risam 2026 (P) Penguin Audio 2026