Reassembling the Influencer: Platform Power and Labour Subjectivities in the Attention Economy

This paper investigates the role of social media platforms in shaping the influencer phenomenon, with the aim of moving beyond deterministic explanations that either attribute this process solely to technological innovation or reduce it to broader social and economic dynamics. Drawing on Actor-Network Theory (ANT), particularly Bruno Latour’s notion of mediators, the paper proposes an analytical framework that treats platforms as active agents in the constitution of what is here conceptualised as attention markets. The research pursues two core objectives: first, to reconstruct the social, economic and cultural conditions that have enabled the emergence of the influencer as a new form of labour subjectivity and a form of neoliberal citizenship; and second, to assess the specific role played by social media platforms within this configuration. Rather than depicting platforms as neutral infrastructures or deterministic forces, the paper argues that they mediate and reconfigure social meanings, values and behaviours related to competition for visibility. The analysis begins with a contextual reconstruction of what is termed the influencer dispositif, using Spain as a case study due to its high number of influencers per capita and the convergence of four key factors: a crisis of media and political intermediation; transformations in the celebrity industry; the fragility of the labour market following the 2008 economic crisis; and the dissemination of individualistic values through discourses such as personal branding and entrepreneurship. This dispositif is understood as an assemblage of elements that promotes a neoliberal model of citizenship based on market worth. The second part of the paper applies ANT to examine how social media platforms contribute to this dispositif through the material construction of attention markets. Analysing the strategic alliance between the advertising sector and digital platforms, it shows how the technical design of these platforms enables new mechanisms for comparing, ranking, and promoting (personal) brands. The paper concludes by reflecting on the political implications of this analysis. It argues that in order to reduce the importance of the pathologies associated with a generalized competition for visibility, it is necessary to pay simultaneous attention to the technical architecture of platforms and the broader social contexts in which they are embedded. While platform design plays a significant role in shaping self-promoting behaviours, these architectures are successful because of their interaction with economic interests and dominant cultural values. Meaningful change, therefore, requires not only technical interventions or alternative platform models, but also a wider cultural and institutional shift that challenges the centrality of advertising and self-promotion in public life. In doing so, the paper contributes to current debates on platform governance, neoliberal subjectivity, and the conditions for a more democratic labour and communication environments.