The Authoritarian Stack

How Tech Billionaires Are Building a Post-Democratic America — And Why Europe Is Next

The Authoritarian Stack

A project led by Prof. Francesca Bria with xof-research.org

Research and editorial team

: Francesca Bria, José Bautista

Data analysis

: Autonomy Institute

Map development and design

: xof-research.org

Web development

: José Núñez

Supported by

: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung

Funded by

: Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) Future of Work

Silicon Valley’s Authoritarian Tech Right is not theorizing this world. They are already building it. The pipelines are operational. The feedback loops are functioning. The sovereignty transfers are completing.

Democracy persists as a legacy interface— maintained for stability, while being systematically hollowed out and replaced.

The question now is... See more

Each new contract deepens the trap. Once Palantir becomes indispensable, once Anduril’s drones are NATO standard, once nuclear facilities power AI that runs everything else— the transformation is irreversible.

It is a paradox with devastating implications: pursuing digital sovereignty while ceding control through every signed contract.

In London, the NHS scaled Palantir’s £330 million Federated Data Platform across tens of millions of patient records, By May 2025, the government had to pay KPMG £8 million just to encourage hospital adoption. Meanwhile, a £1.5 billion defense partnership binds Britain to Palantir’s AI systems.

None of these decisions provoked real debate. Few... See more

Crypto Sovereignty

The Nuclear–AI Complex

SpaceX: Orbital Infrastructure

Anduril: Autonomous Warfare

Palantir: The Operating System of Government

Critical state infrastructures are being privatized across five domains—data, defense, space, energy, and money—the foundations of democratic power. These domains form the architecture of privatized sovereignty: a technological regime where power flows through laws, infrastructure and automated platforms.

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This goes further—commissioning Silicon Valley executives directly into military ranks. In June 2025, four tech executives were sworn in as lieutenant colonels:

The line between contractor and commander has been erased.