Max Grünberg is a cultural theorist navigating the fields of political economy, philosophy, media theory, and the arts. Stemming from an academic background in cultural anthropology and computer science, his research is concerned with the technological conditions of social reproduction. Of particular interest is the inquiry into how artificial intelligence is embedded within our socioeconomic present and what implications this holds for collective emancipation.
His PhD project Algorithmic Realism interrogates the coordinative promise of algorithmic systems to transcend the market order
Another research strand engages with the theory of games by problematising the antipolitics of cooperative games in their negation of the agonal principle. Beyond his academic research, he is co-founder of the Berlin collective and theory space Diffrakt, where he curates the event series Machine Dreams. His writing has appeared in publications such as Historical Materialism, e-flux, and Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
He is on parental leave until August 2025.
Upcoming
24 September, University of Geneva
4-5 December: Center for Social Critique, Berlin
A seminar on the cultural history of the Silicon Valley