Vigitalization: The Sociotechnical Configuration of Structural Surveillance and Algorithmic Governance in the Digital Anthropocene

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Contemporary society faces the ubiquitous proliferation of algorithmic systems that structure social life, from intimate subjective modulation to planetary crisis management. This conceptual paper therefore proposes the analytical category of vigitalization. Rooted in relational sociology, vigitalization is defined as a co-constitutive sociotechnical configuration that fuses datafication with structural surveillance to interpret the autonomization of algorithmic governance. Employing a multilevel theoretical framework bridging the macro (systematicity), meso (grouping), and micro (interaction) dimensions, the study dissects the relational interdependencies between technological infrastructures, political economy, and algocratic bureaucracies. Vigitalization operates under a strict recursive logic: digitizing to monitor and monitoring to digitize, naturalizing behavioral extraction across all institutional boundaries. Crucially, this framework positions vigitalization as the primary sociotechnical matrix governing the ASAM Nexus (Agency-Structure-Algorithm-Matter). By doing so, it equips sociology with the critical apparatus required to address the existential macro-risks, biopolitical subsumption, and biometric enclosures intrinsic to the Digital Anthropocene.