Algorithmic Charisma
How Digital Platforms Are Reshaping Spiritual Authority In African Pentecostalism
This article uses the concept of algorithmic charisma to describe how digital platforms are reshaping spiritual authority in Ghanaian Pentecostalism. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork in Ghana—participant observation at 50 services, 47 interviews, and analysis of over 100 YouTube videos—the article demonstrates that platform metrics (views, likes, shares, subscriber counts) now function as a secondary validation system alongside traditional Weberian "charisma of proof." The central contribution is the distinction between event-based validation, where each prophecy or healing must succeed in the moment, and archive-based validation, where accumulated digital presence absorbs individual failures. Through three ethnographic moments—a prophetic night in Accra, a healing school in Ho, and a prophet's failed social media prophecy—the article shows how platform affordances generate new forms of legitimation. The article's contribution lies not in the coinage of the term but in the theorization of theologized metric authority, the distinction between event-based and archive-based validation, and the account of how platform visibility is interpreted as divine endorsement. The concept of algorithmic charisma contributes to scholarship on digital religion, platform studies, and Pentecostal studies by revealing how algorithmic systems are becoming co-authors of spiritual authority in Ghanaian Pentecostalism.
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