Data will power our economy for the next generation and beyond. We must harness its power.

The two elements which powered the global economy for the last century, a system of free trade and the commodity of oil, have new and serious competitors. In the UK, these competitors are epitomised by two unlikely figures – Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander.

Data is challenging oil as the prime commodity which drives economic growth. It’s the first commodity which has nothing to do with mother nature: it’s created by people like you and me interacting with the world wide web.

In the same way the oil economy gave us massive ‘drilling’ corporations – Texaco, Exxon, BP. the data economy has given us Facebook, Amazon and Google. By understanding the content you read and the products you buy online they can plot how much you earn, what might worry you, and what will nudge you into action.  The ambition for these companies is to create ‘a human collective experience’ and mine it so they can understand what people need before they do. Through data harvesting, the physical economy will become subservient to the digital one.

Nick Clegg, the former Lib Dem deputy prime minister, now works for Facebook as the President of Global Communications, Marketing, and Public Relations.  Basically, he’s ‘the acceptable face’ of Facebook – and as such has become one of the leaders of the data revolution.

The free trade system was effectively sponsored by the US. Instead of controlling trade routes through the traditional process of imperialism, America gave the world freedom to the seas in the name of commerce. Uncle Sam also invested in military might to help police this system which gave economies confidence to pull down trade tariffs – the EU is the greatest expression of this assurance. There is now a backlash in the west against this system by the people it left behind, or citizens worried about the democratic deficit it can create. This is often referred to as populism.

The Chinese are pulling together a rival to free trade called ‘connectivity’. China is investing hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure projects across state boundaries which run along trade routes, the New Silk Road being the most ambitious of these schemes. All routes are controlled by Beijing.

The investment into these infrastructure projects are controlled by China’s rival to the World Bank and IMF, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB). The UK was the first western nation to join the AIIB when George Osborne and Danny Alexander controlled the treasury. In the 2015 General Election, Alexander lost his seat and joined the AIIB as Vice President and Corporate Secretary – the bank’s number two man.

Alexander’s ‘connectivity’ worries me. Populism, with all its faults, clearly demonstrates Western citizens will not stand for democratic deficits, and people globalisation has left behind are finding a voice. The Chinese authoritarian system of centrally controlled and owned ‘connectivity’ is gloved neo-imperialism. It makes no provision for liberalism or democracy.

We have to allow a more nuanced approach to Clegg’s data. It’s the resource which will power our economy for the next generation and beyond. We must harness its power of for the advancement of the western liberal tradition, and use it to stand against Chinese neo-imperialism.