In the heat of the digital revolution of the last four decades, information and computing technologies have permeated our societies to the point of becoming practically ubiquitous, connecting billions of people to each other. The socialist movement was not going to be any exception — and in recent years several groups have emerged under the umbrella of what could be called cybercommunism.

Despite what it may seem, this is not just about communists using computers. In this article we intend to argue that cybernetics, as a science of information and control, complements the critique of Marxist political economy. Indeed, it does so in such a way that it allows us to glimpse the informational substratum hidden behind bourgeois realities, and to compare these latter with alternative institutions in terms of their efficiency and adaptability.

To understand the essential characteristics of this new theoretical paradigm, it is convenient to make a historical review of the concepts, authors, and currents from which it arises. This will ultimately be the intention of this writing: to outline a kind of “family tree” of cybercommunism. Although we will not delve too deeply into it due to space issues, we believe that the schematization that we propose could facilitate a didactical approach to the proposal, as well as define new lines of research.