Chapter 6 draws together the strands and proceeds towards theory-building. Looking for earlier forms of capitalist accumulation with relevant similarities, it employs historical studies and world system theory to capture digital capitalism’s operations as a privatised form of mercantilism. Historically, like today, mercantilism emerged as a strategy for a world without economic growth. In the two eras, mercantilism shares a vision of the global economy as a zero-sum game, using trade monopolies to obtain profit via market control. In both cases, the leading companies operate in global markets that exercise quasi-governmental authority. However, while classic mercantilism was ultimately a political operation with state-granted trade monopolies enriching absolutist rulers, the state today is the loser in many different ways. The chapter revisits the core themes of the preceding chapters (privatisation, financialisation, rent extraction, labour control, inequality) and embeds them in theory. In particular, it develops a theory of social conflict over digital capitalism. The argument is that the social formula implemented by digital capitalism’s leading corporations is an alliance of capital and consumers against labour. This creates role conflicts, as people are usually both consumers and workers. This, the chapter argues, makes social conflict over digital capitalism unlikely.