Dependent development in digital capitalism: The politics of startup policies in the new periphery

As digital technology’s economic importance increases, policymakers pivot to supporting startups—new, small, high-risk firms that produce technological innovation. Tracing the passage of startup policies in Brazil and Spain between 2014 and 2022, this article argues that startup policies do little to reduce peripheral countries’ dependence on the core. In each case, startups advocated for these policies by relying on financial and organizational resources from the giant US-based technology firms known as “Big Tech.” The article makes three contributions to the framework of dependent development. First, it reinforces existing observations that dependence on Big Tech extends beyond the Global South. Second, it revives political analysis of dependency, exploring the political conditions for economic development in the periphery. Lastly, it shows how startups’ political dependence on Big Tech implies important limits on startups’ ability to lead peripheral economies out of dependence on the core.