opencopy.org

- Teich, Ch. 13-14 -

Introduction

The articles “Feminist Perspectives on Technology” and “Do Artifacts Have Politics?”, by Judy Wajcman and Langdon Winner respectively, challenge the notion that technology is a neutral and benign form of progress. Wajcman shows us how technology has always reflected the values of a patriarchal society and how it would need to be dramatically transformed to meet the needs of women. In other words, for Wajcman, technology is a highly gendered way of knowing and doing. Moreover, the artifacts or ‘hardware’ created by technology are “implicated in the masculine project of the domination and control of women and nature.” Not only do they reflect male ideals but also they resist the influence of women. Winner shows us that even the most seemingly neutral and innocent artifacts of technology, such as roads and bridges, can reflect a political agenda. Even when no political agenda is intended, these artifacts can have significant political consequences. These consequences can become fossilized over time, thereby creating unequal and fundamentally anti-democratic social relationships.

Because of the many intended and consequential results of technology, Winner mirrors the earlier argument by Richard Sclove in suggesting that we need to seriously example the complex political consequences that can result from political choices. Where Winner goes much farther than Sclove, however, is in terms of his reappraisal of technology as determining certain social and political arrangements. In particular, he suggests that some recognizably modern technological systems literally force society to adapt to their requirements and nullify political choices based on concepts like liberty.

Thus, Winner addresses one of the key themes in this course. Whereas writers like Wajcman are concerned to contextualize technology in its social and historical environment - thereby making technology a socio-cultural product - Winner takes seriously the claim that technology has certain characteristics and a momentum that allows it to transcend and mould society. Thus, he suggests that some aspects of modern technology are relatively impervious to political intervention, be it capitalist or socialist. Needless to say, Winner’s approach to technological transcendence is not positivistic; he thinks that technological progress and political liberty can run in quite different directions. What is good for a technological system may not be good in terms of individual freedom or a democratic society.

Gender and Technology

Wajcman’s article is a useful summary of the ways that feminist scholars have added to our understanding of the ways that technology is gendered. Fundamentally, she argues that technology is a male dominated activity whose processes and artifacts reflect patriarchy - the desire of men to dominate nature and women. Technology, in this case, is defined in 3 ways: 1) a way of knowing that is different in some ways than science; 2) a series of human activities and practices that reflect social values; and 3) the products or artifacts of technology that take the form of machines or products. This definition is useful because it allows for greater complexity than the more simplistic assumption that technology is simply applied scientific knowledge, and allows us to look more closely at the particular practices and values of those engaged in technology.

The feminist critique of technological writing has evolved over time. The first batch of feminist scholarship focused on the ways that women have been left out of the history of technology. The idea here was to discover and reveal the important role played by women in technological history that had been obscured or demeaned by male commentators. This historical search revealed that women were involved in many of the most important technological innovations in history, particularly in the tools used to transform a hunter-gatherer society to an agricultural one. In addition, the search demonstrated that women were involved in a number of technological innovations centering on the textile industry, including the cotton jenny, the Jacquard loom and the sewing machine. Thus, they played a significant role in the first stage of the industrial revolution.

Thereafter, women were more marginalized because the industrial division of labour and new attitudes towards women as sentimental creatures took them out of the highly visible industrial mode of production and confined them to the home. Even so, women were involved in many more inventions than we might imagine. To some extent, we can recover the contributions of women to technology by looking at patents for inventions. But we also need to understand that many more inventive women cannot be discovered in these patents, which were often taken out in the names of financial backers or husbands. Why husbands? Partly because of patriarchal values - male inventors would be taken much more seriously than female ones. But also because of the Married Women’s Property Act, that made a woman’s property the property of her husband, and that was only abolished in 1882, and only then because aristocratic families wanted to protect some of the dowry that they gave to their daughters in marriage.

There is no doubt that the researchers who recovered women’s involvement in technology made us understand how much the female contribution had been ignored. But such studies only scratched the surface of the gendered history of technology. A much bigger question related to why women and technology appeared so incompatible. Here, feminists began to suggest that western technology reflected male aggression and the desire to conquer nature. It also reflected the highly logical and objective pattern of male thinking that was so different from the emotional, subjective and intuitive thought processes of women. Thus, male dominated architecture expressed male values and even phallic impulses, as reflected in skyscrapers and the shape of weapons.

Scholars working in this tradition typically called for more female involvement in technology to make technology more human, to make architectural environments more nurturing, and to refocus technology away from weapons of destruction to more peaceful and compassionate uses. The benefit of this kind of analysis was that it showed why women resisted “entering technology” or technological fields that evidenced such a preponderance of male values. It also highlighted the different cultural orientations of men and women. What made such an interpretation incomplete, however, was the fact that it assumed that women were inherently feeling, nurturing creatures and ignored the fact that women’s role and function was a historical product of the division of labour in society.

Just as the industrial revolution created a division of labour in the factories, so too it created a division of labour between the genders. In the new and harsh market society, men were expected to be the competitors, the dominators and the breadwinners. Women were shunted off into the homes, where their primary role became that of helpmates to their husbands and nurturers of their children. During the eighteenth-century, many women were involved in the family economy and it was not unusual for women to run businesses. By the mid-nineteenth century, women who performed such roles were considered to be acting unnaturally. Even the intellectual ability of women was denigrated in accordance with their perceived higher function as moral and sensitive creatures. In such a division of gender, it was much more difficult for women to have access to technical knowledge and learning, which became an even more exclusively male domain.

Even when women began to challenge the status quo and pursue educational opportunities that were long denied them, the cultural barrier to technology persisted. Whereas women began to move into certain fields, they long considered fields like medicine (not including nursing), engineering or applied science as foreign and hostile terrain. What is as important as the gendered fossilization of technology along male lines is the fact that technology has clearly been shaped by social interests. Some groups, be they patriarchal males or the middle class, have developed technology in ways that reinforce their own values and power. Technology is anything but a neutral force, as the exclusion of women proves.

Wajcman is aware that that there is more to the history of technology than patriarchal domination or even social contexts that change over time. But she is a contextualist to the extent that she focuses on the ways that socio-cultural environments shape technology either explicitly or implicitly. Many other writers take different approach to technology by looking at the way that technology is determinist. Both approaches can be used complimentarily as is the case in Langdon Winner’s analysis in the article “Do Artifacts Have Politics?”

The Politics of Technology

Some of those who consider technology to be a neutral, and typically benign, force also tend to think that technology is separate from political life. Thus technology can be used by any kind of society, good or bad. Others view technology as a progressive force that somehow improves political life, first by providing individuals with the means for making independent political choices and second by liberating individuals and societies in various ways. Still others view technology as embodying forms of power and authority that can be destructive of human freedoms. Chief among the latter are writers like Max Weber and Jacques Ellul who believe that modern technology and its ethic of efficiency are placing humans and their values within an iron cage of authority.

Langdon Winner discusses all of these issues, including the debate between technological contextualists and technological determinists. His primary claim is that technology can never be considered a neutral force because, explicitly and implicitly, internally and externally, technology is always linked to politics. What is particularly interesting about his argument is the way that it moves from the discussion of politically explicit uses of technology to a more abstract analysis of the political effect of modern technological systems. In the first case, although the political agenda is direct and obvious, there is considerable room for flexibility in choosing technologies or technological relationships. In the latter, political authoritarianism is the unintended and seemingly inevitable consequence of a particular kind of technological organization.

Winner begins by showing us that even the most innocuous forms of technological arrangements can involve political considerations. Robert Moses built roads and bridges covering much of Long Island, New York between 1920 and 1970. In some parkways, deliberately built overpasses and bridges with low clearance in order to prevent buses from traveling to these recreational locations. Buses would have carried working class people to these sites, whereas automobiles during most of this period would have been the primary mode of transportation to these sites. Thus, Moses’ roads and bridges embodied “a systematic social inequality” - a way of keeping the classes separate and providing advantages for one class that were denied to another.

This is not an isolated incidence. Following the 1960s, many new university and college campuses were built in such a way as to deprive students of a large public space where they could gather. The reason for these new architectural arrangements was to limit the possibility of campus protests against the administration. More recently, York’s administration was looking into the possibility of creating more roads into the university, not to improve transport, but to make it more difficult for Faculty unions to bottle up the campus during a strike.

Obviously, these political agenda were conceived prior to the development or proposed development of particular technological arrangements. But political consequences are not always or often so premeditated. Sometimes, they are completely unintended. The creation of a new technology or a new machine like a computer, for example, can sometimes have significant consequences that are not only economic but also political. The computerization of many industries over the past 30 years threw many people out of work and involved struggles between unions and employers that had significant political ramifications. In fact, the automation of many North American factories is one of the reasons why trade unions have lost much of their political power and why formerly working class parties like the NDP in Canada and the Labour Party in Great Britain have had to rethink their constituency and their political agenda.

There are direct and indirect political considerations that need to be taken into account whenever any new technology is introduced. As some of the earlier writers in Technology and the Future suggested, there may be some flexibility surrounding the introduction of new technologies. The early stage of the development of technological systems is an important one for considering and debating the political, social and cultural effects of adoption. If you believe that technology has political implications, for example, then you really need to address the potential impact for egalitarianism, democracy, etc. These are all issues that Richard Sclove advanced in “Technological Politics As If Democracy Really Mattered.”

Where Winner goes beyond Sclove, however, is in discussing technological systems that do not allow such flexibility and “that to choose them is to choose a particular form of political life.” Now, in this discussion, Winner is going to play around with writers like Plato and Friedrich Engels (the co-author with Karl Marx of The Communist Manifesto). All you really need to know about Plato is that he was the first to use the analogy of the capable technician to develop a theory of the aristocratic and authoritarian state. All that you really need to know about Engels is that he knew that the modern factory system, whether in a capitalist or a communist state, implied an authoritarian structure in which men and women needed to adapt to the dictatorship of the machine.

But Plato and Engels are not as important to Winner’s analysis as the economic historian Alfred Chandler. In his book The Visible Hand, Chandler argued that the managerial revolution that began in America during the 1870s established the hegemony of a particular form of social and technological arrangement - “a large-scale, centralized, hierarchical organization administered by highly skilled managers.” This revolutionary new form began in the American railroads but was soon transposed to American business generally. Eventually, it became the blueprint for the modern corporation.

The modern corporation typically uses the most modern technology available to obtain, process and distribute resources. But it is more than a manipulator of technology. The modern managed corporation embodies the ethic of technological efficiency in its administrative hierarchy and management systems. In other words, the modern corporation is itself a “complex technological system” driven by economies of scale and an attention to maximum efficiency. Such technological systems, and the particular technologies that inhabit them, not only have eclipsed more haphazard businesses but they also threaten to eclipse all other forms of reasoning than the technical.

What is Winner getting at here? He’s suggesting that technology is no longer a tool when it is transformed into modern scientific management technique. Technological organization is a form of society that subsumes the human element within a highly rationalistic bureaucracy. What makes a modern corporation so powerful is that it is so centralized, hierarchical and expertly managed that it controls all the employees in the interest of the whole. In this expertly arranged system, any deviation from the basic pattern is not only unlikely but, past a certain limit, intolerable. Moreover, this system is resistant to many human characteristics, including morality and idealism, because such human qualities might interfere with the smooth scientific functioning of the system.

Now, it might be said that large corporations have formal and informal structures, and the later include many human elements that need to be taken into account. While there is a certain amount of truth in this statement, it obscures the fact that modern vertically integrated institutions restrict the influence of informal human elements wherever these might interfere with the smooth working of the system. Moreover, hierarchically managed organizations of any scale also employ experts on informal organizational behaviour precisely to ensure that the human element is controlled and brought into line with organizational objectives.

In vertically integrated corporations, viewed as technical systems, human beings become objects to be manipulated by the system rather than subjects who have individual qualities. That is why these systems are so efficient and productive, because they eliminate many of the risks associated with human error. And what, you may ask, is wrong with that? We have these businesses to than for the high standard of life that we have in North America.

For Winner, there might not be a serious problem here if this managerial and technical model was confined to the corporate community. Business and politics are, at least theoretically, separate domains. Human ideals, such as independence and liberty, can still obtain in the political sphere even if many individuals must necessarily become part of a bureaucratic iron cage in their working lives. How is this any different from the factory worker described by Marx, who needed to submit to the rhythms of the machine at work, but could be compensated by a higher standard of living and greater freedom of choice outside of the factory (at least in a communist or democratic society).

A problem arises, however, when this corporate model becomes applied to all areas of life. When corporate leaders have an inordinate influence on political life, they naturally impose their own vision of efficiency in the other domain. Democracy is far too cumbersome and inefficient to appeal to those who are accustomed to managing large enterprises. When the visible hand of management is applied to political, social and cultural life, everything, including human freedom, is evaluated on the utilitarian grounds of cost-efficiency. The result is further centralization and bureaucratization that limits democratic participation explicitly and implicitly.

Some technological systems are more authoritarian than others. Winner points out, for example, that the use of nuclear energy demands a much higher degree of authoritarianism than others. But, even where technological and corporate systems do not explicitly advance an anti-democratic polity, they almost always justify some “adaptation of social life to technical requirements.” In a society where corporations dominate, and where politicians and corporate managers tend to mirror one another, the technological system is bound to take precedence over individual freedom.

Conclusion

Note that, in his discussion of advanced technological systems, Winner has placed most of his emphasis on the human relations required rather than the artifacts produced. His argument could be even stronger if he attempted to show that our modern corporations not only embody the principle of technē, but also depend on the continual production of new technologies that are foisted upon us in our roles as consumers of technological products. These artifacts are produced at a rate that precludes any serious examination of their effects upon political values.

In a sense, Winner lost his original focus on artifacts when he began to address technological systems. But, as Wajcman pointed out, it is always a good idea in discussions of technology to make distinctions between the different layers of meaning in the word technology. For Wajcman, technology can be a form of knowledge, the ‘know-how’ to implement it, and the artifacts that are produced. It seems to me that Winner adds yet another layer, and perhaps the most important one. Technology also means a strategic division of labour and a particular social relationship designed to maximize technical efficiency. In other words, technology is no longer something that exists within social contexts but is capable of generating and embodying social systems that have been created in its own image. That is what is so different and dangerous about technology in the modern age.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 11-12 -

Introduction

The articles “Technological Politics As If Democracy Really Mattered” and “Black Futurists in the Information Age”, by Richard Sclove and Timothy Jenkins respectively, don’t deal with technology as an abstraction. Rather, they try to show what needs to be done if technology is to empower people. Both authors clearly believe that technology can improve our lives if it is used wisely. Both share a conviction that access to, and ownership of technology, is critical to the well being of social groups, in particular minorities. There is a fundamental difference between the two authors, however, that may not be apparent on first reading. Jenkins is a technocrat who believes that people need to adjust to technological change in order to be empowered. Sclove argues that human empowerment comes when technology is adjusted to human needs. Thus, despite the fact that Jenkins is the champion of black equality and black power his analysis is much more right wing than Sclove’s.

Let’s start with the basic agreement. Both Sclove and Jenkins believe that technology has the power to contribute to human progress. Jenkins is particularly optimistic about the power of the new information technologies to improve the quality of life. He suggests:

On-line computer networks can offer a new town hall. Desktop publishing promises a new public forum. Civic teleconferencing can become a new vehicle for group dialogue. Distance learning will allow a classroom to be worldwide. No longer must music, art, and theatre suffer an unnatural fence. The libraries and museums of the world can be available to the most remote corners of the earth for the first time in history. Diagnostic health care can now be distributed without regard to distance between patients and national hospital specialists. Soon, with everyone able to be his or her own publisher, the means for truth telling as an everyday Internet exchange, rather than the occasional moment, can be at hand.

Sclove, obviously, is more impressed by the power of these new technologies to isolate people from one another. The technologies that he discusses are more traditional, taking the form of architecture, manufacturing, and municipal systems. When he mentions modern digital technologies, such as the Discman/walkman it is to question the assumption of progress. But he is by no means anti-technology, and merely seeks a broader “range of alternative technologies from which to choose.”

The problem for both of these authors is that technological progress is not inevitably a social benefit. It can, and often has, increased the separation between people and reinforce class/economic distinctions. In a sense, both Sclove and Jenkins want to give technology back to the people. In the case of Sclove, the people are local communities; in the case of Jenkins, the people are the black communities of America. But Sclove’s analysis of capitalism and technology is much bleaker than that of Jenkins. For him, our present technological world is inhumane and characterized by an “immense void”. For Jenkins, the major problem is the inability of minorities and their leaders to embrace the possibilities of the Information Age.

Whether or not you agree with their assessment of technology or share these author’s very different perspectives, you should be interested by their assessment of the potential problems that new technology poses, particularly in terms of the overall quality of life of a community.

Sclove offers several examples of the unexpected social consequences and the complex effects of changes. Here’s another provided by authors Willmott and Young from Family and Kinship in East London. During the nineteenth-century, a low-income slum developed in East London England as a result of workers coming into the city looking for work. After the Second World War, a well-intentioned government moved the inhabitants of the East London Slum into a new subsidized housing suburb outside of London. By so doing, they broke up a close, vibrant community and decreased the quality of life for a sizable percentage of the community. In some ways, the old slum was a more livable place because people were not so isolated from one another, shared the supervision of children, and had shops and other amenities close by. In contrast, the suburb divided the community into nuclear families and decreased the variety and richness of the contacts between people.

When looking at the consequences of technological change in all their complexity, it is particularly important to see how they might effect the poorer or weaker segments of any community. The introduction of any new technology will have different positive and negative effects for different members of the population. There is a very real danger that potentially empowering technologies, like the personal computer and the Internet, will increase the disparity between rich and poor within and between nations. Jenkins, for example, is concerned that the Information Superhighway will bypass the majority among the black population of North America unless access ramps are provided and maintained for minorities.

These two authors highlight potential problems that have, or can, result from the introduction of new technologies. The fact that they have very different points of view allows you compare and contrast their analyses. As you will gather, I tend to be critical of Jenkins’ optimistic assessment of the power of technology to improve life and his blatantly capitalistic agenda. I myself am much closer to Sclove in believing that new technologies need to be introduced carefully and with respect for human needs. But you should feel free to draw your own conclusions.

Sclove on Technological Politics

As mentioned above, Sclove is interested in technology in the broadest possible sense and does not really say all that much about the new information and communication technologies (ICT). What he does do is provide a set of criteria for evaluating any new technologies and some interesting examples/models/prototypes on how technology can be humanized. At the heart of Sclove’s analysis is the belief that the key goal of any society is to involve its members/citizens as fully as possible in politics and community life. Such involvement was common in late eighteenth-century America, but it has decreased significantly in the intervening century and a half because of technological progress.

The chief problem with new and increasingly sophisticated technologies is that they contribute to centralization and authoritarianism. Their introduction usually requires economies of scale, standardization, and bureaucratization (about which Sclove surprisingly says relatively little), all of which erodes the former role of the local community. The classic example is water and sewage management. With the urbanization of the nineteenth-century, it was necessary to provide clean water to communities and dispose of the waste/sewage that could cause typhoid and other diseases. These were problems that were most efficiently and cost-effectively dealt with on a municipal and regional scale rather than on a local scale. The development of urban management systems took a lot of economic decision making out of the hand of local councils and put it into the hands of more centralized authorities. As urban societies developed, more and more of the decision-making was centralized and local governments and local governments became smaller and smaller players. The technological imperatives of municipal government in effect “wound up subverting the autonomy and the tradition of local self-governance.”

The stages following early industrialization and urbanization had an even more disastrous effect upon the traditional community. As factories were transformed into modern plants and production increasingly took the form of an assembly line, factories could take on a much larger scale and could be located anywhere. One of the first products of the new assembly line, the automobile, allowed individuals to move to suburbs, thereby gutting the vibrancy of the urban community or the town hall, and separating work from life. The former avenues for worker and community involvement were decreased, especially with the cost-effective architecture of suburbs, which allowed nuclear families to inhabit separate box-like structures that were easily accessible to stores and workplace only with the use of the car.

Clearly, reversing the anti-democratic tendencies of a century and a half of technological development is a difficult task. But experiments and attempts have been done. The Volvo factory in Sweden shows that the linear assembly line is not the only, and certainly not the most human, form of production. Co-operative housing projects have restored seemingly lost areas of public space and brought people together in new and creative ways. The common house in a Co-op in some ways mirrors the old village town hall where people engaged in joint decision making about things that affected their daily lives. New models of town planning have transformed some potentially alienating suburbs into vibrant communities where businesses, daycares, houses, parks and recreational facilities are built more closely together to form places where people can walk to many of their destinations and where genuine communities have a chance to develop. Some national governments have allowed task forces - like the MacKenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry spearheaded by Tomas Berger - that have involved local populations in the decisions that affect them. Some formerly disenfranchised communities - such as the disabled - have effectively mobilized to bring about major changes in the architectural design of facilities to make them more accessible.

Humanizing technology for and by the people is no easy task. It requires consultation and involvement at all stages in the introduction of technology, especially the design stage. That’s why Sclove uses the term RD&D instead of R&D. The development of any truly technology involves more than Research and Development; it must be founded on Research Design and Development. For it is primarily in the design stage that that the mediation between technology and the local community occurs and that a new technology is democratized. Unfortunately, the local community, if it is consulted at all, is usually consulted after the technology has already been designed and is a fait d’accompli.

In addition to focusing attention on the participation of the community at the design stage, Sclove also draws our attention to the need to take into account the complex relationships between different kinds of technology and the society where they are introduced. Thus, Sclove talks about the need to “design [new technologies] to work together as a complementary system applied to an entire technological order.” Too many well-intended researchers focus only on one aspect of the system. The well-known York professor, David Noble, for example, praised the progressive approach to technological development and worker autonomy in a Norwegian factory. However, he failed to point out that the “factory in question was a state-owned weapons production plant.”

In order to ensure that citizens are involved in the design and introduction of humanly comprehensible and comprehensive technological systems, Sclove advocates a set of criteria for a human or democratic technology. These criteria are as follows:

1. Whenever possible, new technologies should be adopted that promote individual freedom, socio-economic equality, and communitarian co-operation. This implies two things: 1) challenging unnecessary centralization of power, and 2) balancing the needs of the individual for freedom with the importance of co-operating as a group.
2. Ensuring that the adoption of any new technologies in the workplace are as humane and humanly fulfilling as possible. This implies: 1) involving working people in envisioning and implementing technological alternatives, and 2) encouraging workers to operate and contribute as part of a team.
3. Whenever possible, using new technologies to empower all the people and limiting their power to disenfranchise groups. This implies: 1) paying attention to real conditions of minorities and women, and 2) designing systems that encourage these groups to participate.
4. Promoting local autonomy and local self-governance wherever possible. This implies: 1) decentralizing power, and 2) making ecological sustainability the responsibility of the local community.
5. Reinforcing local autonomy and self-governance economically by making regions economically self reliant rather than reliant on a remote national or global market. This means: 1) ensuring that regional economies are diversified, and 2) relinquishing as much central control as is economically feasible.
6. Link local communities to national and global communities by promoting the connections between acting locally and thinking globally. This implies: 1) promoting the awareness of eco-system linkages; 2) diffusing an ethic of sustainability within a politics of federation rather than centralization.
7. Avoiding any technologies that could be harmful to the local and the human community generally. This implies: 1) widespread consultation before implementing any new technologies, 2) the delaying or a moratorium on any new technology until all of its potential consequences are understood.
8. Broadening the palate of technological alternatives so as to give people more choice as to the most appropriate technology. This means: 1) decentralizing the process of Research Design and Development, 2) decreasing the number of conditions on, and timetable for, research, and 3) providing adequate funding for local, entrepreneurial, and community based research.

Sclove believes that these recommendations would go a long way towards reversing the technological trend towards local isolation and central authoritarianism. He admits that these suggestions will seem impractical and even utopian in the present climate, where governments and corporations wield immense power over the direction of technology - power that they are not willing to give up, even when the decentralization process is obviously successful. For example, he cites the case of architectural reforms at the University of Louvain in Brussels, Belgium, where the university administration axed organic architectural reforms designed to “mitigate the alienating architecture of the adjacent hospital.”

Sclove seems to put his faith in the dynamic of an increasing number of local mobilizations “for a democratic politics of technology.” But it is difficult to see how these local initiatives could garner more than isolated successes against the juggernaut of centralization and bureaucratic authoritarianism. It is interesting that Sclove says so little about a major technological development that was occurring while he was writing this article - the so-called information revolution. In many respects, this would appear to be the most important battleground for the democratization of technology.

Jenkins’ Optimistic Vision of the Information Age

Fortunately for our purposes, this is the theme of the article by Timothy Jenkins entitled “Black Futurists in the Information Age.” Jenkins tends to be a little uncritical of the centralizing potential of the computer revolution and altogether too naïve about its democratic potential. Especially when commercialized and consumerized, the computer industry and the World Wide Web are technologies that have some disturbing tendencies that we have seen in other lectures in the course. IT and ICT are technologies whose net utility and benefits to society are far less than their hype. At the same time as they foist the latest technological advances upon us as individuals, they draw us into a global community that is rapidly erasing local differences.

By this, I do not mean to suggest that there are not democratic possibilities in the ability of individuals and groups to communicate with one another, disseminate information, and discuss alternatives. Nor do I dismiss the potential of new technologies for improving health, education and the quality of life. But I think that it is important to ask ourselves who controls these new technologies and for what purposes? IT and ITC give governments and corporations much greater power for surveillance, control and manipulation. The Information Superhighway allows some very powerful groups access into our homes and lives. Moreover, the perceived importance of constantly keeping abreast of new technologies turns us into continually upgrading consumers, while the pleasure that we obtain from our expenditures is questionable. Thus, there are some problems with Jenkins’ overly naïve and optimistic perspective on the information age, not to mention that any link between the information revolution and a higher quality of life is tenuous at best.

Perhaps Jenkins can be forgiven for not addressing some of these issues. After all, he runs a multi-media firm and is personally profiting and being empowered by the Information Age. But there are aspects of his argument that make it more self-serving and devious than merely naïve. First, he clearly wants a leadership position for himself or people like him in the black community. He feels that individuals who rely on moral persuasion rather than accurate information have frozen people like him out of leadership positions. Second, he identifies himself with a managerial/administrative capitalist elite, which makes him something of a problem. The racial divide in America is not simply a matter of colour; it is also a matter of economic class, and, arguably, Jenkins shares the values of his class when he devalues systemic racism in the United States and focuses more on self-reliance. Third, even if you find these criticisms of Jenkins unconvincing, there can be no doubt that he is interested in empowerment primarily for capitalist reasons.

Jenkins continually refers to the fact that the black community is a huge market segment. Blacks and other minorities consumed over $6 billion in electronic equipment and products in 1994 alone and spent more per capita on such products than the general U.S. market. Jenkins’ ideal world is one where capitalists like himself have power and influence in the black community and where blacks consume the multi-media products that he creates. None of this means that Jenkins arguments are invalid, only that we need to put them in perspective. If he and his friends become the gatecrashers of the Information Age, they stand to make a very good profit from this initiative.

That said, let’s look more closely at Jenkins’ particular claims. He suggests that the new information revolution will totally change the nature of society. Those who do not get on the information bandwagon will be left far behind. In real factual terms, they will be economically and socially disenfranchised in the new world - what Jenkins calls “road kill of the Information Superhighway.” The black leadership of the past relied on oratory and moral persuasion to win blacks civil rights and legal equality. They have, however, now fossilized that leadership style and are totally out of touch and completely ill-equipped to lead the black community into a new information age.

For Jenkins, the tragedy here is that the Information Age and emergent technologies will “impact monumentally on every area of human life” and will be the “keys for determining economic, and employment opportunity, freedom of expression, educational attainment and meaningful political participation.” Jenkins points out that factual rather than formal participation is already being undermined by the new realities of competing in the global technological village. Unless the black community participates in the information revolution, they are doomed to become the underclass in a “technological caste system.”

All the while this technological window of opportunity is open, the leadership of the black community have gotten used to “slow dancing” with “majority group power holders.” They fail to realize that, unless they act quickly to ensure “access to computers at home or in school”, the black community will fall so far behind that the “only forces left to determine individual and group access to knowledge” will be “unrestrained market forces.” The window of opportunity for providing access for minority groups is closing. Once class and economic advantage are secured, the window will close forever.

Jenkins is advocating a particular brand of Black capitalism, one that recognizes the potential market for computer products in the black community and that elevates the people who provide these goods to leadership positions. Despite his attacks on the crude cash register nexus and the “backward corporate attitude”, Jenkins clearly identifies with modern management that uses spread sheets, statistical information, and that processes information efficiently. This viewpoint helps to explain Jenkins’ particular slant on black history. He believes that black leadership began as preachers, who were accepted because they invoked divine rather than earthly power. From there, it moved to teachers, who were acceptable because they were part of the social structure and could be easily controlled. Eventually, black leadership shifted to lawyers and doctors as professionally “safe agents” of change in the community.

The new role that Jenkins invokes for the black leader is that of the revolutionary capitalist, who has a “bold” view of economic realities and the managerial expertise to implement change. Thus, he advocates a social revolution wherein managerial capitalists like himself are the authority figures. The managerial style of capitalism that Jenkins advocates resembles scientific management in its emphasis on statistics, systems, and procedures and in its condemnation of the “widespread organizational dysfunction” of a black community that is in serious denial of the new economic reality. That denial is shown in the tendency of the black community to blame all social ills on systemic racism rather than to focus on the need for internal and individual reform.

Jenkins commitment to Black capitalism is further demonstrated in his dismissal of public solutions to social problems. Thus, he cites the “shortcomings” of “occasionally destabilized institutions” that turn out to be housing authorities, welfare agencies, churches, colleges, public school systems, subsidized health and housing, etc. These are, in large part, the “crux of the problem”. The solution is the modern scientific manager who understands the “necessary connection between valid information management and desired outcomes.”

In addition to being an advocate of Black capitalism, Jenkins also appears as something of a technocrat in his insistence that, unless the black community gets on the information bandwagon soon, the result will be “catastrophic” and the result will be “permanent Depression-like conditions”. In other words, the technological imperative is the external condition that requires a kind of compliance that “traditional leadership types” cannot achieve without a “radical metamorphosis.” While Jenkins attacks the “fiery sound bites” of traditional black leaders, his own advocacy of the leadership black technologists as revolutionary gatecrashers hardly constitutes a more “sober analysis”. Indeed, he is even willing to invoke the anything but sober analysis of Malcolm X, when he suggests that we need to establish access to the Information Superhighway “by any means necessary.”

What does this leadership revolution amount to in reality? Two things. First, the rule of a new kind of management that understands “systems analysis, computer literacy, multimedia, and telecommunications. Second, a readjustment of the relationship between the domestic economy and “worldwide labour and capital markets.” Third, a “dedicated effort to recycle the purchasing power of the black community.” This final agenda turns out to be of tremendous significance, since Jenkins goes into great detail on how a new style of leadership could act as a broker to the $450 billion in earnings and consumer power within the black community.

At the end of the article, Jenkins makes a sop to the traditional black leadership by calling for a marriage of old-style morality and modern technology that he calls the “high-touch of the world of high-tech.” But take away such platitudes and the references to reversing the future of disenfranchised blacks and the only real marriage that you are left with is the one between capitalism and technology. In fact, Jenkins has eliminated much of the social (i.e. public) framework that controlled and humanized technology. If the black community wants to be vibrant, it has to adapt to a technological future that is shaped by capitalists operating within a global market.

Conclusion

Sclove provides us with a model for assessing the pros and cons of any new technology in terms of its impact on democratic politics and personal empowerment. It is not a simple model but one that contains a number of related criteria that are supposed to “work together in a complementary system applied to an entire technological order.” These criteria are designed to significantly limit and shape the introduction of any new technologies. If you agree with Sclove that technology needs to be controlled and shaped in a human and humane direction, then his “democratic politics of technology” makes good sense.

One of the problems with Sclove’s analysis is that it doesn’t really take into account the power of centralized institutions, corporations and bureaucracies to set the technological agenda. It appears somewhat naïve, idealistic, and perhaps even archaic in its attempt to return to a social word where local communities had a great deal of power over technology. Moreover, it barely touches upon the most dramatic technological developments since the Industrial Revolution - the development of an Information Society.

Jenkins deals explicitly with modern technology, in the form of the IT and ICT revolution. Unfortunately, he doesn’t really provide a framework for humanizing technology apart from some platitudes about combining high tech with high-touch. Despite the fact that he wants to empower a disadvantaged community, his socio-economic agenda is much more right wing and more distinctly technocratic than the argument advanced by Sclove. Jenkins wants the black community to embrace new technology and to ride the opportunities to personal empowerment and group advancement. An unfriendly critic might suggest that, at best, the advantages will accrue to a relatively small percentage of capitalists and symbolic workers in the black community. Moreover, Jenkins’ plan to mobilize black spending power would appear to focus on the roles of blacks as passive consumers of technological products rather than their empowerment. People like Jenkins might have increased status and wealth as a result of embracing the Information Society and the Global Village. It is more difficult to see how the black community as a whole will profit from the Information Age.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 9-10 -

Protestant Economics

In his essay “Can Technology Be Humane?” Paul Goodman makes an interesting claim about the nature of modern science and technology. Basically, he argues that there is nothing intrinsically wrong with a technological civilization but rather that the problem lies in the way that it has been dominated by government bureaucrats, self-interested corporations, and a bloated educational system. The fundamental failure of modern civilization is that it has become over-technologized.

Goodman believes that the twin western emphasis on rationalism and the scientific way of life is a good thing. These concepts reflect not only our culture but also encompass our moral core. They have been prostituted to the extent that mechanical systems of production and the bureaucratic emphases on centralization and specialization are destroying personal relationships and community values. The term destruction is highly appropriate because modern science and technology:

1. No longer can claim to be improving the quality of life of the inhabitants of the advanced countries.
2. Are wasteful, not only in the production of entirely unnecessary goods and gadgets but also in the duplication of efforts.
3. Treat human beings as things rather than serve their needs.
4. Create incredibly complex systems that can no longer solve local or community problems effectively.
5. Result in ecological breakdown.
6. Reward triviality, corruption, and phoniness.

None of these problems is inherent in science and technology itself, argues Goodman. They are the effect of moral corruption. Science and technology have “fallen willingly under the dominion of money and power.

Goodman’s attempt to solve this problem is partial and traditional. For example, he claims that a moral reformation must occur that puts technology and science back into its rightful place. In other words, he advocates a return to the moral values of the Western (i.e. largely Protestant) past without being able to say exactly what shape that reformation will take. But he does provide some guidelines by suggesting that the new reformation will involve considerable decentralization and localization of the funding for scientific and technological research. Moreover, there will need to be a new emphasis on the more prudent development of technology to serve human needs. Finally, future technological development will need to be more ecologically sound, meaning that researchers will need to focus on the appropriateness of technology to the physical and human environments where it will be applied.

This agenda means a return to a more pure and ethically sound form of the scientific way of life. Despite the fact that Goodman believes that communal decisions are too important to leave to scientists and technicians; and despite his interest in the development of scientifically knowledgeable citizens; Goodman has a special role for those engaged in the scientific and technological professions. He wants to revive scientific and technological attitudes that existed in the past:

For three hundred years, science and scientific technology had an unblemished and justified reputation as a wonderful adventure, pouring out practical benefits, and liberating the spirit from the errors of superstition and traditional fail. During this century they have finally been the only generally credited system of explanation and problem solving.

The key to reformation is to develop scientific and technological professionals with character and moral fibre. They should be trained not only in their specialization, but also in the “social sciences, law, the fine arts, and medicine, as well as relevant natural sciences.”

This new kind of scientific and technological professional - the technologist - will be an individual who accepts responsibility for his/her actions; stands up to “the front office and urban politicians”; and belongs to a professional organization that supports this new ethic of responsibility. Thus, Goodman is able to get around the major problem facing those who believe in the power of technology when wisely used - the fact that it gives those engaged in science and technology considerable power in wider society.

Clearly, there are lots of problems in Goodman’s reformation scenario. While he suggests that modern technology society is a highly complex and interlocked system, he appears to believe that we can still return to the more simple values of the past. While he decries the modern educational system - with its specializations endless “catechism of tests” - he still believes that the education of scientists and technicians can somehow be reformed and made more ethically meaningful. Goodman puts his faith in a spiritual revival that he sees developing all around him as people begin to question the loss of meaning in modern life in affluent societies.

Goodman’s emphasis is on a spiritual revival. He thinks that the “present difficulty is religious and historical”. Simply to try to eliminate corruption or change institutions would not be sufficient for Goodman. What is really necessary is “to alter the entire relationship of science, technology, and social needs both in men’s minds and in fact.” He thinks that it is because the spiritual, or moral focus if you will, has been lost, that we have got ourselves into a serious problem. He thinks that problem is evidenced in modern culture. As he says: “Without moral philosophy, people have nothing but sentiments.” We can see those inchoate sentiments displayed on talk shows like Oprah every day, when people without any clear philosophy of life clap whenever they hear a sentiment with which they can agree.

Goodman’s emphasis on spiritual revival is intrinsically western, i.e. Protestant. Goodman doesn’t really define this Protestant mind set very well, but clearly it involves a certain set of values that include:

1. A commitment to western rationalism and, in particular, scientific logic.
2. Faith in the freedom and power of the individual.
3. A desire to investigate God’s nature and discover (not manufacture) useful knowledge.
4. A firm belief in the power of science and technology to improve the human condition.

When you tease out some of these western values, however, you might want to ask yourself whether they are not part of the problem rather than the solution. The emphasis on logic and reason tends to lead towards excessive rationalism and the loss of a spiritual core. The hegemony of the individual leads, if not towards selfishness, at least towards self-centeredness. The attempt to discover nature’s secrets implies scientific complexity and the kind of specialization that givens science and technology a hegemonic position. The belief in the power of science and technology elevates those activities even further until they become a substitute for spirituality.

These criticisms are especially valid if one stops to look at the structure of Goodman’s argument. The article hinges on spirituality, but there is nothing especially spiritual about Goodman’s argument. If this is a ‘Protestant’ analysis, then why is there no discussion of heaven or the relationship between heaven and earth. Goodman appears to want to define his spirituality in terms of moral philosophy, but that only begs the question. How can a moral philosophy be spiritual without a deeper religious core? If moral philosophy replaces religion doesn’t that pave the way for making any kind of spiritual argument irrelevant. What Goodman mentions but doesn’t show us is the way that Western rationalism (particularly Protestantism) evolved into a special combination of materialism with bureaucratic rationalism that made science and technology less humane.

Buddhist Economics

Given the fact that Western rationalism has led to greater materialism and less spirituality, it is not surprising that many of those who seek to reassert an element of spirituality into our modern technology have looked to other spiritual systems. One of the most influential religious systems that are transforming our way of looking at science and technology is Buddhism. In “Buddhist Economics”, for example, E.F. Schumacher tries to show us that Buddhism offers an alternative spiritual approach that could help not only the advanced nations but also those nations that are confronting scientific and technological development in an effort to improve the conditions of life in poor regions.

Schumacher was a German born, British practicing, economist. His understanding of Buddhism is limited largely to a few basic principles such as: right livelihood, the middle way, non-violence and the eight-fold path. He applies these principles rather crudely in his own philosophy of appropriate or intermediate technology. Before discussing his argument, therefore, we might want to say a few things about Buddhism and its spiritual core.

Buddhism is sometimes describes as religion without a God. There is no God in Buddhism because spirituality revolves around a personal awakening. That awakening, usually achieved through meditation, allows the individual to realize that there is no such thing as the self and that all life is interconnected. The spiritual core of Buddhism is self-annihilation or nothing. Once the interconnectedness of life is understood there is no thing that anyone can cling to. Liberation is achieved through letting go of all attachments. The full process of liberation can take a long time, since Buddhists believe in reincarnation.

All life is interconnected and even inert materials like rocks are at some level animate for the Buddhist. The unnecessary destruction of any living thing is a consequence of believing that all things are on a spiritual path towards awakening. To perform unnecessary violence on any living thing, especially the higher forms of mammals, is morally wrong for Buddhists, who practice the principle of non-violence. Some monks will even try to stay as still as humanly possible so as not to disturb even the microscopic forms of life around them.

In some stricter forms of Buddhism, the practical consequences of this position can be quite extreme. The individual focuses totally on the awakening process and gives up everything that is not necessary to support life. The Buddhist monk carries a begging bowl and receives food from others, who benefit spiritual by supporting those who are on a more direct path to enlightenment. The monk gives up all craving for material objects, living as simply as possible so as not to be deflected from his/her goal. In strict monastic societies, almost all forms of technology are considered useless since they do not further one’s spiritual journey.

It is usually the less strict forms of Buddhism that interest Western critics of science and technology. These forms of Buddhism, including Zen, are not monkish, at least not in the traditional sense. Practitioners believe that spirituality is not only for austere monks but that the average person can achieve an awakening. The average individual, of course, has to live and work in the material world. In order to make a living, individuals will need to utilize the different forms of technology that are available. Living and working in the material world is often referred to as the ‘Middle Way’ to spiritual development. It means being able to live and work in the world but without clinging to worldly things.

This is a difficult concept to translate. But basically it involves appreciating the things of this life - love, sex, food, clothing, shelter, and cultural trappings - for what they are and nothing more. One can enjoy the things of this life even more as a Buddhist because one isn’t so attached to them as to crave them. Craving things means objectifying and deifying objects. It implies greed and possessiveness. It involves violence in trying to control things and competitiveness with others to get one’s share of them.

The Middle Way involves moderation. A Buddhist can take what they need from the material world, but they lose their spiritual center whenever the things of this world take over their minds. Also, since everything is connected, any abuse of the things of this world, through over consumption or waste, means committing violence on nature. Nature, of course, means both human nature and the physical world since there is not the same distinction that exists in Christianity. Whereas in Christianity, man is given dominance over nature, in Buddhist mankind and nature are one. Any harm done to nature is the same as doing harm to oneself.

Living in the material world is doable for the moderate Buddhist but only on his/her own terms. In any society, there will exist a range of occupations or ways of making a living. Many of these are harmful or wasteful occupations that any self-respecting Buddhist would naturally shun. As for those occupations that are not intrinsically wrong, a moderate Buddhist would tend to choose ones that “nourished and enlivened the higher man and urged him to produce the best he is capable of.” In other words, one’s occupation should be more than simply a way of making a living, it should encourage the development of one’s spiritual personality.”

“Right-livelihood” is an important term in moderate Buddhism. It is important not to get it confused with the Christian, specifically Protestant, concept of work. In Protestant theology, work is a way of disciplining ourselves and keeping our bodies and ourselves obedient. We discover fulfillment through the pursuit of our vocation, which we are supposed to do to the best of our ability. But, as fulfilling as work is, it still remains a punishment for our sins. In the moderate forms of Buddhism, whatever one does, particularly one’s work, is part of one’s spiritual path. Labour, particularly labour that is of benefit to others, is fundamentally religious.

In Protestantism, it doesn’t matter what one does for a living, provided it is not evil. The point is individual discipline and self-control. The emphasis is on the self-development of the worker. In Buddhism, the relationship is much more complex, the kind of work that one does really matters and the entire point of labour is the maximization of selflessness. Whatever one does, one does it to the best degree possible, not out of a desire for individual creativity or achievement, but out of a selfless desire to contribute to the well being of others.

A key work in the moderate Buddhist paradigm, and one that is strangely missing from Schumacher’s essay is compassion. Material life is a painful journey for every living being. The natural response is to feel compassion. By feeling compassion for others, one feels less for oneself. That’s why it is important to pick an occupation - a right livelihood - where one is doing good for others. That’s also why it is important, however insignificant one’s task, that one do it as selflessly as possible.

Schumacher tends to mix up Protestant and Buddhist principles when he talks about the “nourishing and enlivening factor of disciplined work”. His view of the importance of labour and full-employment is inherently Western. To put it bluntly, a Buddhist doesn’t need a job, occupation or craft to achieve personal dignity or “to display his scale of values and develop his personality.” A Buddhist can practice right-livelihood as a monk, as a wife, or in any kind of labour that contributes to the human weal. Moreover, it is misleading to talk about terms like personal dignity and the development of a personality through work. Spirituality comes from within; spirituality is what forms personality; and spirituality needs no scale on which to display itself.

Why focus on these differences? Well, they are important. A good Protestant needs work to define and nourish himself or herself. A good Buddhist doesn’t define himself or herself by their work. A good Protestant needs a job and a respectable position in society much more than a good Buddhist does. A good Buddhist is much more discriminating about what they will and will not do to secure a right livelihood. This makes the Buddhist much freer to choose in a modern economy than someone with a Christian background. The Buddhist’s dignity is not tied to occupational respectability. A Buddhist would prefer to do a job that is trivial and demeaning than one that is personally nourishing and enlivening, if the latter is in any way harmful.

Now that we’ve got a handle on the principle behind “Right-Livelihood”, let’s unpack its economic implications. A great many occupations in affluent and technologically advanced societies involve one or more of the following:

1. An excessive use of natural resources.
2. Direct or indirect harm to other living beings or the natural environment.
3. The exploitation of people for selfish ends.
4. The manufacture and manipulation of artificial needs (i.e. cravings)
5. The wasteful consumption of resources.

In a nutshell, Buddhism is anti-materialistic and directly opposed to the ethic of consumerism. While not directly anti-scientific or anti-technological, moderate Buddhism opposes the use of science and technology whenever these promote materialism or consumerism. To the extent that technology has distracted human beings from their spiritual mission, and increased their materialist cravings, Buddhists are very effective critics on religious grounds.

But moderate Buddhism is doubly effective as a critique of technological society but it incorporates a healthy dose of common sense. Buddhists were among the first to offer an analysis of the globe as an interconnected ecosystem that could be irreparably damaged through wasteful consumption. They were among the first to advocate the moderate use of resources and to point out the dangers of a selfish, egotistical and possessive approach to the products of nature. Because of their emphasis on fairness and compassion to all living creatures, they were also among the first to defend the weak against the aggression of the rich and powerful elements in society.

It is important to remember that Buddhist common sense comes from a particular approach to living in the material world. The teachings of Buddha are obviously common sensical in their emphasis on a “reverent and nonviolent attitude” not only to sentient beings, but all living things. This attitude is fundamentally different from the more rationalist ethic described by Paul Goodman that arguably led to the nonsensical destruction of the planet through the aid of science and technology. In Schumacher’s terms, Buddhist common sense leads its followers to making important distinctions about what constitutes “the most rational way of economic life.”

In making some of these distinctions, Schumacher often reads his own biases into Buddhism. In particular, he transforms Buddhists into the defenders of alternative or appropriate technologies that emphasize “simplicity, individual self-worth and self-reliance, labour intensiveness rather than capital intensiveness, minimum energy use, consistency with environmental quality, and decentralization rather than centralization.” While Schumacher’s emphasis on the self is completely alien to Buddhist philosophy, he is quite right about some of these things. For example, all Buddhists regard it as important to conserve as much energy as possible. All Buddhists would agree that it is important to live a simple life, and to provide for basic human needs on the small and modest scale rather than to produce large quantities of disposable goods. Buddhism remains one of the most effective critiques of a consumer society, driven by constant cravings rather than genuine needs, in our age. As for the environment, suffice it to say that the North American environmental movement adopted Buddhist concepts from its infancy. In fact, the author of the America’s first recognizably environmental work, David Thoreau in Walden, was obviously influenced by eastern religion.

The problem with Schumacher is that he makes Buddhists sound like technological reactionaries and even rural primitives. Nothing could be further from the truth Buddhists were among the first to embrace the computer and information revolution, and for spiritual reasons. The Internet conforms to the Buddhist notion of an interlinked global network that transcends physical space. It also provides opportunities for greater understanding and communication between cultures. Greater understanding leads to greater identification, and greater identification leads to compassion.

The moderate Buddhist emphasis on justice and compassion means that modern communications technologies must be used to promote a more global community. Just because these global technologies also advance a corporate and consumerist agenda, that doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be used for other purposes. Moderate Buddhists are more than willing to embrace new technologies whenever and wherever they can serve a human and an ecological purpose.

Buddhist economics, as Schumacher invented it, is not one that would necessarily prefer a local or small-scale perspective to a global one. In some situations, the local viewpoint is common-sensical and most conservative of scarce resources. But in some cases, problems and solutions must be dealt with on a global basis. Buddhists are among the most active advocates of a global political community. A global political community in some ways implies a global economy. Moreover, only a globally based economy based on technology can improve the conditions of life of the poorest regions of the globe. The Buddhist imperative of compassion means that we need to use technology to improve the global community.

Conclusion

Of course, using technology as a tool doesn’t mean becoming obsessed by it or craving the useless products that can be manufactured by modern technological systems. Centralization in some respects does not deny decentralization, and the preservation of local cultures, in others. The point is that Buddhism, at least in its moderate forms, is not anti-technological. It does, however, appear to have the spiritual capacity for subsuming and restraining technological and economic progress within certain bounds. There is no given appropriate technology for Buddhists; what Buddhism appears to have is a clear idea of the appropriate path that economics and technology should take. What is particularly interesting about Buddhism, as opposed to Western religious systems, is the confidence, vitality and flexibility of Buddhism in the face of technological progress.

What appears equally revealing, Goodman’s plea for a new Protestant reformation notwithstanding is the powerlessness of unreformed Christianity to direct, or stem the tide, of technological progress that no longer contributes to the quality of life. Perhaps Western religion is paralyzed because it sowed many of the seeds of rationalism and materialism that now confront us. It is fascinating that the most clear examples of a Christian reformation expressly designed to meet modern challenges is borrowing heavily from non-Western religious traditions such as North American native society and Buddhism that described a very different kind of relationship between nature, man and the divine.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 7-8 -

Introduction

The most important thing to notice about the articles “The Role of Technology in Society” and “Technology: The Opiate of the Intellectuals” is that they provide an explicit debate. This debate revolves around differing conceptions of the place of technology in society. When examining a debate, it is important to notice where the debaters agree and where they disagree. In the introduction, Teich obscures the areas of agreement by informing the reader that the authors have a fundamentally different perspectives based on the vantage point of the powerful and the powerless. That’s true but it may not be the best way to categorize the differences and it doesn’t take into account some very interesting similarities.

Points of Agreement

1. Mesthene and McDermott both agree that technological positivism and pessimism really miss the complex and subtle interactions between technological development and society. Both writers want to explore those “subtle relationships”.
2. Mesthene and McDermott both agree that technological advance has negative consequences that relate directly to technological change. Mesthene is not a simple or simplistic cheerleader for new technologies.
3. Mesthene and McDermott both criticize the presumed mystical autonomy “presumed to lie in technology” and demand that technological change and social values be better aligned.
4. Both Mesthene and McDermott suggest that a major problem with the introduction of new technologies is social and individual dislocation. Mesthene, for example, points out that the development of new transportation systems widened the gap between the rich and poor and made the American inner cities places of poverty and unemployment.
5. Both Mesthene and McDermott agree that that one of the major problems of a technologically advancing capitalist nation the irresponsibility of private individuals and large corporations who put profits before the interests of people.
6. Mesthene and McDermott would also agree that one of the most serious negative effects of technology is the erosion of traditional freedoms and democratic processes that Americans fought for over the course of two centuries.
7. Both Mesthene and McDermott conclude that the scope and complexity of “public decision making” in a technological society results in systems of social organization that are centralized, controlling and fundamentally undemocratic.
8. Both Mesthene and McDermott believe that, while the overall level of social control is increasing dramatically, it has become much more subtle, indirect and manipulative.
9. Both Mesthene and McDermott would probably agree that we need “new institutional farms and new social mechanisms” or the “political conflict” of the 1960s will increase.

Laissez innovers

There appear to be so many points of agreement between Mesthene and McDermott that you might wonder why McDermott is so aggressive in his attack on what he calls laissez innovers. Let’s define the term to see what McDermott is getting at. Laissez-faire means ‘let it be’; the term was coined by eighteenth-century French economists do define a free market in grain. Gradually, it came to be equated with the creation of a free market (i.e. capitalist economy).

McDermott has serious reservations about a free market because he believes that capitalist economics means the exploitation of the powerless by the powerful for their own ends. In other words, the term laissez-faire was not neutral. It involved elements of control and oppression that people had to fight against in order to create a more humane and democratic society. To a certain extent, McDermott believes that the American people did win significant rights in the twentieth-century through their greater involvement in the political process.

McDermott believes that the people are losing their ability to influence the political process and to defend their interests in a developing technological society. Laissez innover means freedom for technological innovation. The lack of significant social controls over technology means those who control the direction of technology have much more power over people’s lives than ever before. In order for laissez innover to exist, social relations and social values have to be rationalized in ways that allow the controllers of technology to take advantage of the opportunities that technology provides. The primary emphasis in a society based on laissez innover, therefore, is constant technological innovation that is mirrored and reinforced by institutional innovation.

In such a technology-directed environment, McDermott suggests, human values must be directed by technological development. But technological development is not simply an abstraction. Technology is a series of innovations, and also systematic processes, that are directed by a small group of people. These elites push technology in directions that are favourable to the self-interest of their group. In a technological society, they are able to do this very effectively because the vast majority of people haven’t got the specialized expertise or the understanding of highly complex systems that would allow them to participate in decision-making.

The Technocratic Perspective

Mesthene clearly understands the problems and disadvantages associated with the introduction of new technologies. He is also willing to criticize capitalists and corporations who don’t seem to understand the damage and social dislocation that new technologies can bring in their wake. None of this, however, stops him from being a technocrat. A technocrat is someone who advocates a government or social system that is controlled by scientific technicians.

At no point in his article does Mesthene ever suggest that technology should be controlled by a democratic society. Quite the reverse; he believes that “decision-making structures” need to be adjusted “to the realities of technology so as to take maximum advantage of the opportunities it offers and so that we can act to contain its potential ill effects before they become so pervasive and urgent as to seem uncontrollable.”

Who is going to achieve this balancing act? Mesthene doesn’t say explicitly, but he does give us lots of information that allows us to draw the appropriate conclusion. It has to be achieved from above, since most of the people don’t understand the complexities of a modern technological society. It can’t be achieved, or if so only formally, by represented officials, because most of them don’t have the specialized skills in data collection and systems analysis that are required for the task. The groups who will marry the needs of a complex society are trained experts who can commit the enormous amount of time and develop the skills necessary to “foster technology on a large scale.”

Mesthene suggests an enormously important role for two groups in society. The first are the technological innovators - scientists and technicians - who generate opportunities. The second are the social engineers or those whose job it is to make sure that the political structures and values of society conform to the reality of a modern technological society. The net result is a society controlled by experts with a technological agenda. The average person needs to have their values changed to come into line with technological reality. Popular democracy is a thing of the past; society now must be rationally managed.

Is this assessment of Mesthene too harsh? Look at what he says. He says that the entire logic of modern decision making “requires greater and greater dependence on the collection and analysis of data and on the use of technological devices and scientific techniques.” In other words, a technological society will be created by fundamentally technological means. Second, he says that public policy can no longer be based on anything other than reliable knowledge which he describes as “a strong capability to collect, aggregate, and analyze detailed data about economic activities, social patterns, popular attitudes, and political trends.” Third, he suggests that we as individuals can no longer play a significant role in decision making because modern societies are complex systems rather than collections of free and independent individuals. In a complex system, everyone is dependent on everyone else and individuals need to be controlled to ensure the greatest health of the social organism. Fourth, he dismisses any defense of the dignity of the individual or objection to our “increasing dependence of decision making on scientific and technological devices an techniques” with the claim that a small group of knowledgeable experts needs to “save the society before it explores under planless and inadequate administration.

In a technocratic world, “social and psychological displacements” are not signs that the system itself may be haywire. Rather, they are problems or “paradoxes” for technocratic experts to solve. Technology is the motor that continually runs ahead of man’s ability to deal with it.

Technology as Opiate

In “Technology: The Opiate of the Intellectuals”, John McDermott claims that this technocratic position gives technology way to much power over people. It transforms technology into an abstraction. That abstraction, despite the acceptance of negative problems associated with technology, is inevitable. It is also scientifically pure, just as long as it is controlled by experts - intellectuals like Mesthene. With the intellectuals at the help, technology can be a self-correcting system.

McDermott thinks that this viewpoint is extremely naïve. Take for example, Mesthene’s anticapitalist statements. McDermott suggests that Mesthene’s heart might be in the right place; Mesthene might think that he and his friends will shape technology for the benefit of mankind. But what guarantee is there that the new technocratic elite will not simply perpetuate themselves and increase their power in society? Even worse, what it this technocratic elite merely increase the power of those who really control the production, use and distribution of new technologies - the people that McDermott stereotypes as profit driven corporations and their “managerial cronies.”

For McDermott, a technocratic society is not an abstraction but a specific set of social relationships in which the power to make decisions in concentrated in the hands of scientific-technical bureaucracies. Technocracy is not so much about finding ways to bring social institutions into line with technological realities. It is an institutional movement and culture in its own right that “improves and rationalizes the performance of its machines and men” within quite specific and tightly “integrated systems.” These systems place such an emphasis on the control of any “negative externalities” that they are remarkably resistant to “intervention by persons or problems operating outside or below their managing groups.”

In a technocratic scenario, politics becomes irrelevant. There is no need (a la Mesthene) to bring politics into line with technology because “technology creates its own politics.” Not only is the natural impulse of technology to create highly efficient systems that limit the potential for individual disruption, but also they are so “capital intensive” that the power of the individual is effectively inconsequential. Only those who have senior managerial power to control the flow of capital investment, or the technical knowledge to take advantage of opportunities, have any real power in a technocratic society.

For McDermott, the spread and mystification of technocratic values is a serious threat to democracy. The formal ingredients of democracy might persist for some time, but a technocratic society cuts the majority of people out of power sharing and limits their influence on the decisions made that profoundly effect their lives. A technological society that is controlled by scientific and technical elites takes knowledge out of the hands of the people and reserves it for a small group - the meritocracy.

The Rise of the Meritocracy

McDermott views technocracy as an attempt to centralize and control power in the hands of the few against the many. Someone like Mesthene could conceivably argue that, while some dislocation and perceived powerlessness is the inevitable result of technological change, that does not mean that the fundamental requirement for a democratic society ceases to exist. He could, and probably would, argue that a technocratic society is democratic because it needs to identify and reward the smartest and most hard working people in society - the group that McDermott dismisses as “the intellectuals.”

To be sure, not everyone can be a member of the elite. But assuming that Mesthene is right and we can create an elite cadre of scientists and technicians from our university and college system, would that be such a bad thing? Just as long as everyone has “equality of opportunity”, the best people would rise to the top. Isn’t that what everyone wants a democratic society to do? Isn’t one of the problems with more primitive capitalism precisely that it distributes social rewards unevenly and sometimes unfairly.

Many technocrats like Mesthene believe in the power of higher education to ensure that people with merit rise to the top. Mesthene himself is an example of a person who has achieved distinction at one of America’s top universities - Harvard. On the other hand, McDermott appears to have had a much more uneven experience in the Department of Labour Studies at the State University of New York. Perhaps, McDermott’s criticism of Mesthene is partly the result of sour grapes and the “scientific and technical elite and their indispensable managerial cronies are the really creative (and hardworking and altruistic elements in American society.”

McDermott doesn’t really address the issue of merit head on. But we can illuminate the debate somewhat by doing it for him. He could suggest, for example, that a technocratic society favours those who come from families with the economic means to pursue higher education. He might want to argue that a meritocracy cannot exist without a massive investment in education generally, in order to make sure that those with ability have the opportunity to achieve. He could point out that many so-called meritocracies do not really promote people with the best ability; in fact, they tend to be self-perpetuating and to provide a few people with quite exceptional opportunities to achieve. These are questions that go to the very heart of our present system of higher education and give rise to intense differences of opinion.

While McDermott hints at some of these issues, however, they are not his primary concern. His real issue is that a technocratic society, a meritocracy if you will, relegates the majority of the people to minor roles in society. McDermott puts this rather strongly when he suggests, “the common mass of men are essentially drags on the social weal.” Thus, technocracy breeds an elitism that strikes at the heart of democracy. That kind of elitism is only implicit in Mesthene’s discussion of the social displacement that comes with technological development. But in other writers, it can be quite explicit. Zbigniew Brzezinski, writing ironically for the left leaning The New Republic, suggested that the technetronic society of the future would be run by a “singularly talented few”. The rest of the population would have to content themselves with being passive players in society and pursuing their own individual interests.

The Imperative of Control

Equality of opportunity in a technocratic society, paradoxically, creates a very inegalitarian, hierarchical, and role stratified society. In the past, such societies have been inherently unstable and characterized by class or other kinds of conflict. But conflict is the antithesis of a technocratic society, which requires a high degree of social control in order to ensure the integrity of systems.

It is the implicit element of social control that most worries McDermott. Both McDermott and Mesthene agree that a technological society means centralization and the control of power in the hands of a few. How will the many be controlled so as not to threaten the few? Mesthene provides some suggestions when he claims that the increased knowledge and subtle techniques of the key decision makers will allow them to develop new institutional forms and new mechanisms for better integrating individuals into the system. Even if these techniques were not explicitly coercive, it is difficult to see how they could avoid being manipulative. After all, the system cannot function unless discordant negative externalities are suppressed.

McDermott mentions other forms of social control, the chief being the ideology of technology itself. Technology may have conquered nature, but it can only conquer man if people internalize it. That is why the advocates of technology constantly push not only the rationality of technology, but also its millenarian promise. A technological society cannot rely on communicating a future utopia in the face of problems and dislocations, so it also promotes a hedonistic lifestyle that distracts people from their powerlessness. Thus Brezinski, for example, is quite open in suggesting that hedonistic preoccupations will “serve as a social valve, reducing tensions and political frustration.” Political men and women are transformed into a consumer community, aided by advertising, the promotion of credit cards, and selective service channeling (i.e. cable television).

Writing in the 1960s, McDermott believed that the technological system was far too complex, and its controls too indirect, to be stable. He believed that “advancing technology” had “an ever declining capacity to enforce the required discipline…” Of course, he was writing during the hippy era, when the civil rights movement and anti-war protest were at their height. During such a period, it was possible to envision alternatives to the status quo and even to posit social revolution. The technological society has advanced since then.

The Altruistic Bureaucrat

Clearly, despite their areas of agreement, McDermott and Mesthene have distinctly different views of technology. For Mesthene, a technological society is inevitable and provides humanity with opportunities. The trick is to deal with the problems; something that can only be achieved if power is given to a small group of people to ensure that scientific and social engineering are in harmony. These people would by definition be modern society’s problem solvers and entirely neutral because they are rewarded for their disinterested ability to bring their scientific and technical knowledge to bear on social problems. For McDermott, this kind of thinking borders on technocracy. A technocratic society is not desirable because it would mean the end of democracy. Moreover, it would be inherently unstable and conflict ridden because it deprives the majority of any effective power.

Where McDermott and Mesthene disagree most violently is in their assessment of the new scientifically trained elite that would have hegemony in a technological society. For Mesthene, these individuals are the saviours who would “save the society before it explodes under planlessness and inadequate administration. For Mesthene, this would simply represent a new self-perpetuating social elite. By presenting himself and his colleagues as anything more than right wing defenders of the status quo, Mesthene is either being totally naïve or engaging in deception for reasons of self-interest.

One aspect of this debate is worth considering in our present context. Mesthene’s argument is mildly anticapitalist. The elite that Mesthene describes could come from the ranks of business, but his heroes more closely resemble scientists, technicians, and civil servants (the social engineers). When Mesthene wrote his article, university scientists were much more independent than they are today, when universities and governments are looking at the bottom line and increasingly seeking partnerships with the corporate community. Moreover, Mesthene wrote his article at a time when the public sector in North America was still at the height of its power, prior to the advent of privatization and the exodus of some of the public sector’s finest minds.

Conclusion

Do the changes of the past 4 decades strengthen or weaken Mesthene’s or McDermott’s arguments? Consider that the corporate community has much greater power over government and the direction of technology than it did in the 60s. Consider also that the social conflicts of McDermott’s time have dissipated. Does putting their arguments in historical context make these arguments as relevant today as they were when they were written?

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 5-6 -

The essays “Why I Am Not Going to Buy a Computer” and “Technology and the Tragic View” are examples of high quality literary journalism. Literary journalism differs from news reporting in a number of ways. It is literary in the sense that it makes great literature or the production of literature its touchstone. It is poetic in its appeal to our emotions. It is humanistic to the extent that it tries to capture what is unique and valuable in the human spirit. Finally, literary journalism is typically highly personal even subjective, although it tries to make the connection between the uniquely personal and a broader humanity.

It is important to understand these characteristics when dealing with literary journalism. It is inappropriate, for example, to challenge the claims of such writers as though they were reporting facts or making social scientific claims. And, although these articles can be viewed as logical arguments defending or advancing a position, it is even inappropriate to judge such writing on philosophical grounds. The kind of arguments that are made here depend as much on intuition, the appropriateness of the metaphors used, and the recognition of ambiguity, as they do on formal logic.

That doesn’t mean that we can’t challenge or debate these kinds of arguments; it simply means that we need to do so on the articles’ terms. In this lecture, I’m going to try to show you how to evaluate or discuss these kinds of readings without missing the point.

In “Why I Am Not Going to Buy a Computer”, for example, Wendell Berry claims that the benefits of computers are sufficiently ambiguous that he feels justified in rejecting them, despite the fact that most of the other writers he knows have computers. He is not suggesting that other writers stop using computers. He admits that he relies on technology in many aspects of his life. He suggests, however, that one needs to weight the pros and cons of using any particular technology.

His larger argument comes out in his rebuttal of critics. These critics largely misread Berry’s argument by treating it as an unambiguous attack on technology. They pushed the implications of Berry’s argument to the point of suggesting that Berry would be happier with a quill and parchment. They attacked Berry as someone who should have a bad conscience because he is not entirely consistent in his behaviour. Finally, they accused Berry of inhumanity in using his wife as an amensis or scribe.

Berry’s reply to his critics also evidences certain kinds of problems. Instead of pointing out that his critics had missed the point, Berry stereotypes them as technological fundamentalists and as individuals who “cannot tolerate the smallest difference of opinion.” Clearly, Berry is equally guilty of missing the point, since some of his critics obviously cannot be labeled as technological fundamentalists. At worst, they are people who feel the need to go on the defensive because of the implied criticism in Berry’s article. Obviously, the reason that they feel so defensive is because they agree to some extent with parts of Berry’s position.

Fortunately, Berry does rise above the squabble by elevating

1. We live in a society where institutions and corporations constantly encourage us to consume new technologies without thinking about their use and the consequences.
2. Many of those who are critical of governments and new technologies fail to question their own practices.
3. The first duty of private individuals is to question and curtail their own patterns of consumption if they want to create a conserving society.

Now, we might wish to debate these claims by Berry, but they are interesting claims that force us to think more deeply (and subjectively) about the advance of technology and our roles within it. Moreover, the best thing about this literary/subjective approach is that it doesn’t shy from the ambiguity of the human condition, especially as it applies to technology.

Another article that deals with the ambiguity of the human condition, from an even more explicitly literary perspective is “Technology and the Tragic View.” This article makes several connected arguments:

1. Technological developments almost always bring in their train “unanticipated problems”. The defence of technological progress as leading towards utopia or a perfect society simply is not plausible.
2. The business community manipulates our naïve belief in “optimistic materialism” through the adoption of technological gadgets to turn us into “gleeful consumers.”
3. It is a sign of maturity and responsibility in individuals and societies to be able to “consider the dark complexities of technological change.” These can be seen by looking at 1) housing technologies, 2) medical innovations, and 3) the transportation revolution.
4. The social shift from a naïve enthusiasm for technology in the eighteenth-century to a more pessimistic viewpoint in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century is linked in America to the shift from youthful enthusiasm to a disenchanted adulthood.
5. The appropriate solution is neither a false optimism nor a paralytic pessimism. It is, rather, an acceptance of the ambiguities of living in the world.
6. The correct response to living in the real world of ambiguity is the noble vision or tragic viewpoint. In this viewpoint, we recognize that we will make mistakes and even fail, but we heroically chose to act bravely and to accept responsibility for our actions.
7. Simple resignation or Stoicism is not an appropriate response to our tragic human condition. Stoicism means rejecting the world by being totally self-controlled and thereby immune to the world’s distractions. The Greek (and later Shakespearian) tragedians advocated a different course of action by affirming heroism while noting its limitations.
8. The model of a tragic hero with respect to technology is the Greek god Prometheus. Prometheus brought the ability to make fire - arguably the most important of all technologies - to humanity. For this, he was severely punished by the gods who chained him to a mountain and allowed evil harpies (part bird, part demon) to eat his entrails.

There are a lot of interesting things going on in this article, no doubt. In some ways, the message resembles that of Berry in its emphasis on the human condition with respect to technology. Certainly, both writers point to ambiguity. With respect to this ambiguity, Florman presents a great deal more in the way of literary allusion and metaphor, making his work superficially more complex.

Why superficially? Well, Florman looks as though he is making a subtle literary argument, but this argument tends to fall apart because it does not provide insights that turn out to be very deep. This is because many of the article’s claims fail to meet the criteria that would allow us to act responsibly and maturely. There is a serious literary misrepresentation in the central argument is that the “tragic view accepts responsibility but does not seek to cast blame.” But that’s not what literary ambiguity or the tragic vision did at all.

The tragic vision clearly did accept a certain amount of ambiguity in the human condition. No matter what the individual hero did, he or she was always subject to fate and to the need to make choices. So far so good for Florman. But Greek and Shakespearian tragic heroes never escaped judgment or blame. In fact, they always had a tragic flaw that led to their downfall. In Greek drama, that flaw was explicitly pointed out by the Greek chorus, which represented the Greek community and commented on the behaviour of the heroes. While the good qualities of the hero were admirable, it was the bad or evil consequences that sunk him or her.

What Florman does is the exact opposite. He tends to use the ambiguity of the human condition to obscure the distinction between good and evil that the dramatic tragedians sought to preserve. Whereas the tragedians wanted to show us how good and evil could be determined in a complex world, Florman wants to substitute a continuum between good and evil. This allows him to obscure very real problems within phrases like “the pro-growth industrialist and the environmentalist are both needed, and in a strange way they need each other.”

Looked at from a different (and essentially Hegelian) perspective, Florman is suggesting that health and goodness comes out of the conflict between those who want to develop new technologies and those who want to limit them. The German philosopher Hegel suggested that the evils and bloodshed of this world were understandable because they were essentially progressive. Individual morality was largely irrelevant to the great stream of historical progress that was built on the frailties of mankind. Florman echoes these beliefs, not only by directly referring to Hegel, but also by affirming the desire to “move on, actively seeking to realize our constantly changing vision of a more satisfactory society.”

Am I claiming too much to suggest that Florman’s tragic vision is not the vision of the Greek tragedians at all? To my way of thinking, when all the trappings of responsibility and complexity are dropped, Florman’s vision is quite technocratic. It is an apology for always pursuing the technological agenda, just as long as we accept responsibility for our actions. Moreover, Florman buttresses his version of the tragic vision by including elements that no tragic dramatist would recognize. In the conclusion to his essay for Home & Garden, Florman introduces the concepts of compassion and adventure. We must pursue technological solutions because these will help us to improve the lot of suffering people. Moreover, we must pursue technological solutions because they are part of some grand human adventure. These concepts may or may not be a useful way of describing the technological impulse. But they are not developed here, or linked to the central argument. They end up being an uncritical apology for technology.

Florman’s article resembles many that are written from a fundamentally pro-technology bias. He accepts the fact that there are problems associated with the introduction of new technologies but argues that there is no alternative. Moreover, he defends this position by referring to a body of literature that admittedly “is an affirmation of the value of life” but that has a very different agenda from the one that Florman proposes. Florman caricatures Greek tragedy to fit his purpose and, by so doing, obscures and even twists much of its ethical content.

Florman’s discussion of hubris and Stoicism are good examples of the way that he twists concepts to his own purpose. Stoicism, or supreme self-control, was a school of thought in ancient Greece. While adherents to this school could often be extreme - nothing external could affect their composure and they were often accused of being unfeeling - stoic values were integral to Greek thought and to Greek drama. Stoicism encouraged balance and independence, values that were positively represented in tragic literature, and that contrast to Florman’s emphasis on compassion that was a much later literary development.

Florman dismisses Stoicism because he finds it too pessimistic for his tastes and too out of touch with reality. On the other hand, he elevates the quality of hubris or “overweening pride.” We need to observe the slight of hand that Florman engages in here. On the one hand, he admits that pride leads to a fall. In fact, hubris is the chief cause of the fall of the hero in Greek tragedy. But Florman simultaneously suggests that pride:

which in drama invariably leads to a fall, is not considered sinful by the great tragedians. It is an essential element of humanity’s greatness. It is what inspires heroes to confront the universe, to challenge the status quo.

This is a serious misrepresentation of the message of Greek tragedy. It is not the self-centred pride that the Greek tragedians wanted to praise. It is the bravery, honour, self-control and ability to endure that makes these heroes great and that renders their downfall lamentable. The idea that pride is a good thing until it becomes extreme is not the message of Greek or any other tragedy. A sense of honour and a striving for excellence (arête) is very different from pride, which is a self-centred emotion that is dangerous to the community. Greek literature and culture did not advocate the striving for knowledge and adventure that went beyond the bounds of community.

That is precisely why Prometheus was punished. He went against the consensus of the Gods by bringing technology to man. But Prometheus was a legend and not a figure of Greek tragedy. His relevance to this discussion is debatable. The actual living person who is relevant to this discussion is Socrates. The Greeks condoned the death of Socrates from hemlock precisely because he had too much hubris. Everyone living in the Greek empire knew that Socrates was a brilliant philosopher and a dialectician. No one wanted to execute him. But Socrates’ pride meant that he constantly challenged the status quo and was a potential revolutionary. Therefore, in the interest of the community, the Greek state allowed and tacitly encouraged his death.

By attempting to use the Greeks to promote technology, Florman is really not being true to the spirit or letter of his literary sources. In fact, he is doing something quite shifty. He is twisting literary symbols to suit his own purpose. Despite the fact that Florman spends a great deal of time talking about the “dark complexities of technological change”, there is no doubt where the sympathies of this literary engineer lie:

Prometheus defied Zeus and brought technical knowledge to the human race. Prometheus was a revolutionary. So were Gutenberg, Watt, Edison, and Ford. Technology is revolutionary. Therefore, hostility towards technology is antirevolutionary, which is to say it is reactionary.

Sentences like this tell us exactly where Florman stands. Anything that involves a critique of technology is not only “reactionary” but also contrary to an entire Western tradition of tragic heroism. Moreover, it is fundamentally unrealistic, immature and contrary to a vital life filled with noble spirit. And, if you don’t like that assessment, Florman is willing to tell you that you also lack compassion and a sense of adventure to boot.

So, I didn’t find Florman’s article anywhere near as balanced and “insightful” as the editor of Technology and the Future suggests in his introduction. You don’t need to agree with me on this one. What I wanted to show you here is how to critique a literary and subjective approach to technology. Here are some steps to follow:

1. Pay attention to the author’s background and interests.
2. Get a feel for the entire case that is being made. Be prepared to go beyond any explicit claims for impartiality or evidence of a balanced argument.
3. See if the language and examples are appropriate to the subject matter.
4. Search for hidden assumptions or implications.
5. Assess the authority or the foundation upon which the argument rests.
6. Above all, never accept an author’s generalizations about this foundation or his/her literary illusions at their face value. Whenever you can, examine these independently.
7. Always assume that an author will interpret the literature and symbols of the past in ways that fit his/her own paradigm (i.e. view of the world).
8. Be prepared to challenge the appropriateness of the author’s interpretations. For example, in the article “Technology and the Tragic View”, Forman advances a very idiosyncratic and misleading interpretation of the Greek Tragedians that fundamentally misses the point. In fact, a truer reading of tragic drama poses serious problems for the technological point of view.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 4 -

Introduction

Weinberg is a physicist who worked in large-scale atomic energy R & D. He is the man who invented the term technological fix. There are lots of ways to look at his article; however, before doing so, let’s get a handle on the term that he coined - a term that has such negative connotations today.

It’s important to do this because Weinberg’s use of the term technological fix is much more measured and conservative than the way it was used by those who became techno-enthusiasts. First, Weinberg suggests that technological fixes and social engineering need to be used together. Technology that ignores social realities will simply not work. So, Weinberg is not a simplistic techno-booster. Second, Weinberg notes that technological fixes often only address part of the problem. They tend to be remedies for certain components within a problem and they don’t usually address the entire problem in all its profundity. Third, technological fixes often create new problems in their own right. These problems can be both technological and social. It is important to appreciate these related problems rather than to regard technology as a savior. Finally, the exploitation of technological fixes cannot come from within the technological domain itself. Social problems need to be identified by governments. Then governments need to invest in targeted research around those problems in order to discover and develop appropriate technologies.

Weinberg, therefore, is not making hugely exaggerated claims about the unilateral ability of technology to solve social problems. He does, however, suggest that new technologies and techniques can significantly address some of the most significant problems facing human societies. Let’s look at his examples. One of his examples is the Intra-Uterine Device for birth control. If population growth is, as many believe, a serious problem in terms of available resources and planetary pollution, then this device is an extremely useful one. It does not eliminate the social component. In many cultures, manhood and fertility are associated with the production of children. Social values will need to change in Spanish American countries, for example, if population growth is going to be reduced.

But where new technology can eliminate a problem, suggests Weinberg, it can dramatically reduce the need for social engineering (i.e. changing social values). Technology is particularly useful, in this respect, because social and cultural values are so very hard to change. We might spend a lot of energy, for example, trying to get North Americans to consume less and thereby produce less waste, but if we found technological ways of transforming or utilizing that waste, we could significantly reduce the problem.

I don’t think many would disagree with Weinberg about the potential utility of technology in solving the problems that have bedeviled society for centuries. In fact, compared to many techno boosters, he appears to have a balanced approached. Pragmatically, he assesses human nature for what it is and doesn’t expect a reformation overnight.

It is when we begin to assess some of the particular conclusions of this powerful and influential scientist (a former member of the President’s Science Advisory Committee) that we begin to identify some problems.

Problem 1: Vested Interests

Throughout this brief article, Weinberg advocates the use of nuclear (atomic) energy to solve the world’s energy problem. He informs us that nuclear energy is a cheap solution to some of the world’s most persistent problems. It will allow Third World countries to industrialize without the need for fossil fuels. It will allow us to transform seawater into fresh water and to transform deserts into productive agricultural communities. Water from the sea can be transformed into water that is acceptable for agriculture at a mere cost of 10 cents per 1,000 gallons. With a technology like that, he says, all the nations of the world can achieve energy autarky (self-sufficiency).

This sounds very much like techno-boosterism. The claim is very sweeping and not at all balanced. Moreover, during the 60s, many scientists were aware of the potential dangers of nuclear energy. Yet there is nothing here about those dangers, only more claims that we can get enough hydrogen out of nuclear processes to: 1) eliminate automobile exhaust; and 2) produce sufficient fertilizer to make the entire globe productive.

Here is a scientist partially pleading for an investment in his own research field. In fact, you could read the entire article as an advertisement for nuclear research posing as an impartial examination of technology.

Problem 2: Capitalizing on Man’s Weaknesses

It is one thing to suggest that technological fixes might provide more effective and agreeable solutions than social engineering, and quite another to use technological fixes to reinforce greed and aggression. Weinberg suggests not only that we accept “man’s intrinsic short-comings” but also that we “circumvent them or capitalize on them for socially useful ends.” In other words, we make safer cars for people who drink and drive; we transform rather than reduce waste; we produce more goods faster so that people can keep consuming.

Now this is a very dangerous strategy for a number of reasons. First, while social engineering in the past has not reformed human nature, it has discouraged excessive behaviours. The strategy outlined above has a direct tendency to encourage negative behaviours, on the grounds that there exists a technological fix. Moreover, the strategy encourages those in power or with means to exploit the word’s resources and to manipulate the weaknesses of consumers, on the grounds that this is the most practical and effective way to solve problems. Finally, the focus of governments and those in power clearly shifts away from controlling problems towards putting their faith in new technologies that can solve them.

Note just a few of the very problematic things that Weinberg says. He acts irresponsibly by telling us what he is not going to suggest any fanciful Technological fixes, but then he does mention them: 1) the fundamental cause of race riots in the United States is the “hot, humid weather” that could be eliminated by providing everyone with low cost air conditioners; 2) the elimination of human unhappiness with “soma pills” (i.e. anti-depressants. It is hard to believe that Weinberg does not realize that these fanciful suggestions are anything but, and that his argument provides ammunition for all kinds of scientific and technological research that is manipulative.

Problem 3: The Co-operation of Technical and Social Engineers

Throughout his little article, Weinberg suggests that technical fixes and social engineering must work together to solve the world’s biggest problems. He uses the term social engineering in a positive way - to create “a better society, and thereby, a better life, for all of us who are a part of society.”

There is another way of looking at this marriage of technology and social engineering and one that is not far fetched given Weinberg’s argument that it is appropriate to manipulate men and women’s weaknesses. That is to explicitly use technology to control human beings in the ways you want. Once you accept the manipulation of man’s weaknesses for socially useful ends as an acceptable strategy, the door is open to the use and abuse of technology by those in economic and political power. It is difficult to believe that Weinberg is not appealing at some level to those in power in society when he advances such arguments.

Problem 4: The Argument for Deterrence

Individuals may have differing views on the development of nuclear weapons. One argument is that these weapons are so potentially destructive that they should be banned altogether. Another is that these powerful weapons actually prevent warfare because the results would be horrific. It’s o.k. to have differing viewpoints on such topics.

But, in an article on technological fixes, it is highly problematic to use the development of nuclear weapons as a rationale for investing in technology. Where is the scientific neutrality of Weinberg claiming that he would cast his “vote for the weapons technologist”? The claim that this technology “stabilizes our imperfect and precarious peace” is disputable at the very least.

Surely, one would think, Weinberg could use other less-loaded examples to make his case. The fact that he takes this issue head on suggests several things. First, he is an apologist for nuclear energy in all its forms, including weapons. Second, he is justifying the U.S. industrial military complex that funds much of the atomic research in America. Third, he is suggesting that weapons technologists play a critical role in modern society, thereby eliminating the need for a personal and social discussion of the ethics involved in creating weapons of mass destruction.

Conclusion

While the general argument of Weinberg’s article provides few problems, his assumptions and examples provide much ground for concern. Here is a person who justifies the status quo. He uses his position of intellectual and technical authority to advocate the manipulation of people’s weaknesses. He promotes an alliance between technical and social engineers that is nothing short of dangerous. He defends the vested interests of his own particular field of scientific research - nuclear energy. He inflates the potential of technological development while barely mentioning its disadvantages.

In fact, you would never know that Weinberg was writing his article in the mid 60s, just when people were beginning to criticize nuclear energy, environmental pollution, the arms race, etc. The picture Weinberg presents may appear to be theoretically balanced, but it is an overly rosy one to say the least.

While Weinberg is willing to admit that technology cannot solve all social problems, he clearly believes that technology plays a major role. Moreover, by explicitly linking technological and social engineering, Weinberg greatly enhances the role of technique, technology, specialization and the control of experts in the modern world. By the end of the article, one has a clear sense that Weinberg is justifying and elevating the control of society by experts in the interest of greater technological efficiency.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 3 -

Technological Momentum is a theory about the relationship between technology and society that purports to go beyond two other basic approaches - technological determinism and social construction. Essentially, Hughes argues that the relationship between technology and society is not only complex, but also differs based on the particular stage that a technology reaches. During the early stages of the development of any particular technology, the influence of social factors will be at its greatest. These social factors include: design choice; geographical location; the individual contributions of engineers, scientists and workers; the significance attached to a particular technology; the perceived needs of the community or state, etc. In other words, in the early stages of the development of any technological system, that system will be shaped by society.

As a system develops momentum, however, as it grows and develops, the technological system will have more influence on society - it will begin to shape society

• The investment in the new technology will encourage those who support it financially, such as governments, to maintain and reproduce it.
• Those who work in the new technology will have a vested interest in seeing it grow and prosper. They will try to incorporate more social elements into their domain.
• As a new technology develops, it also gathers around it a large bureaucracy. Bureaucracies tend to be self-perpetuating and to mould society in their image.

Thus, while in the earlier stages of development, the social environment can play a significant role in shaping a new technology, that possibility decreases significantly over time. This means that, if you want to influence technological development, it is important to do so in the early stages.

While the social influence on technology may be real, there are difficulties associated with making that influence more broadly based. In the early stages of the development of a technological system like EBASCO, the American electrical utility, those who had the most significant influence were those electrical engineers who had the technological (hardware and software) core to contribute to the creation of a system. While these individuals had to negotiate with society in the early history of the system, they were hardly a broad based democratic group. Thus, the potential influence on the early shape of the system was limited largely to a few experts.

Another example of a technological system is the computer industry. In the early days of the computer industry, people had the room to make choices about the development of the system. A lot of different computer languages were developed and a lot of different systems emerged, reflecting very different human choices. Today, with technological momentum and the convergence of digital technologies, platforms are becoming increasingly standard and uniform. Many individuals look nostalgically back to the early days of computers, when there was more room for creativity and when computers afforded ample scope for human creativity. But we should be aware that the choices made were made for us by individuals with technical expertise.

My point here is that, even if Hughes is correct, and there is scope for influencing technology in its early stages, the choices are often made by people who have a particular technical orientation. Thus, the ability of society to influence technological development may be much less than Hughes supposes. To be sure, technology developers are human beings with social values and needs. But they represent a quite specialized sub-set of the community and one, arguably, with a vested interest in technological progress for its own sake. By the time that a particular technological system is developed, it is often too late to significantly challenge its control over society.

As you will gather from this, I myself incline towards technological determinism. I think that the social construction concept dangerously ignores the power that modern technological systems have over us. I think that the concept of technological momentum, while more sophisticated, tends to fool us into thinking that society can resist technological control by acting strategically at particular points in the development of a technological system.

But, if I am going to call myself a technological determinist, I need to take issue with some of Hughes’ descriptions of that school of thought. Technological determinism is not what Hughes’ makes it out to be. In his discussion of Jacques Ellul, for example, Hughes claims that Ellul argues that the human made environment is structured by technological systems, and goes so far as to suggest that these are “as determining in their effects as the natural environment of Charles Darwin.” Thus, human beings are merely artifacts of technological systems. That’s not what Ellul argued at all.

In the first place, Ellul did not argue that technology was a primary cause of society. He followed Max Weber in arguing that technology could be considered neutral. The real villain is Western rationalism with its emphasis on efficiency. Once technology was married with the ethic of efficiency it became something supra-human. The technology of earlier societies, for example, consisted of tools that were designed to meet particular human needs. The subservience of humans to technology only occurred when the ethic of efficiency began to dominate, as it did in the scientific management theories of people like Frederick Winslow Taylor. The ethic of Western rationalism - with a particular emphasis on scientific efficiency - has a much longer history than the history of technology. The word that Ellul preferred to use to describe the increasing control of modern technology over humanity reflects the fact that he was taking more about technological systematization than technology per se. The word he liked to use was technique. Technique doesn’t even need to suppose a particular technology.

Ellul was not the simplistic technological determinist that Hughes pictures him as being. In fact, he had something of a momentum theory of his own, but one that was much more sophisticated than Hughes. He argued that the emphasis on technique (read efficiency, specialization, expertise and supra-human values into this term) has been gathering momentum in Western society since the medieval period. In other words, technological momentum is not something that can be confined to particular technological systems but was a movement that embraced all of Western culture and that was embodied in Western rationalism. That momentum reached a particular and momental moment in the nineteenth-century when it became linked to technology and self-perpetuating.

Ellul clearly is a pessimist. He believes that once the rise of technique reached a particular point (it doesn’t matter exactly when - either in the Industrial Revolution or in the Scientific Management of the late nineteenth-century), it became irreversible. Western culture evolved to the point where men and women became the tools of technology, rather than visa versa. You might say, as Hughes does, that men and women became artifacts of technological determinism. But Ellul’s concept of technological determinism does not resemble Darwin’s theory of speciation. It is a human and a historical development. It may no longer be reversible, but that doesn’t mean that it was inevitable.

Ellul, therefore, is not a technological determinist, at least not in the sense that Hughes pictures him as being. Moreover, contrary to what Hughes argues, Ellul’s concept of technology is much richer and more complex than Hughes. Ellul is able to reconstruct an entire pattern developing in Western history, whereas Hughes simply discusses particular instances, such as the development of electrical systems. Ellul pinpoints a dangerous tendency in Western civilization, whereas Hughes lulls us into thinking that society has more influence than it does. Ellul describes the watershed that has made modern technological society truly inimical to human ways of knowing and feeling, whereas Hughes skates on the superficial surface of a more complex relationship between society and technology.

Ellul is not the only victim of Hughes tendency to make superficial generalizations. Hughes also calls Karl Marx a technological determinist. Actually, Hughes has more reason to view Marx in this way than Ellul. For Marx quite explicitly drew a link between his own theories and those of Charles Darwin. He claimed that his theory of dialectical materialism or class conflict was a scientific model of the struggle for survival in a material world.

Technology has an important place in Marx’s vision of world and, in some respects can be seen to be deterministic. But we need to untangle the role of technology and its relation to things human in Marx. First, technological developments, particularly in the form of the division of labour and machine production, are responses to a genuine human problem - the need to provide the material goods necessary to life. Technological developments in the form of the mode of production dictate the social and cultural conditions of life at particular points in history, but they never define humanity. They can’t define humanity, or turn all human beings into tools, for two primary reasons.

First, the mode of production has always been controlled by particular classes and designed to serve their interests. Thus, they have always been the tools of the oppression of other classes in society. The different interests of the different classes mean that any particular technology is the domain of social and economic conflict. Conflict implies a disagreement on the ways that technology is deployed and about the distribution of the benefits of technology. Technology, therefore, is always subservient to social and economic classes.

To be sure, Marx was firm believer in technological progress, but progress for him was measured in social and economic terms. The successive revolutions in the mode of production were made and exploited by social classes. These classes may not have represented all of humanity; they may have been oppressors; but they were not any the less human for that. If anything, Marx showed us how social classes used technology to oppress others and allowed us to illuminate the problems inherent in a class-based ideology of technological progress.

Marx’s view of technological progress was much more complicated than Hughes suggests. For as long as human beings needed to struggle to produce the material goods of life, new technologies were decisive to be sure. Any increase in the productive capacity and any increase in technological efficiency make a real contribution to human welfare in situations where economic needs are decisive. But Marx never viewed technology as self-perpetuating for its own sake. He believed that the factory system, once subsumed within a collectivist framework, would easily provide sufficient material goods for everyone (i.e. the working class). Once those once pernicious conditions of life were met, any new technologies would become the servant of humanity.

The only reason that technology was an oppressor and an alienator was because there was not enough production to go around. In the feudal system, aristocrats played a useful (but no less oppressive) role because they allowed a very limited and inelastic agricultural surplus to flow into the production of value added products. In the industrial system, factory owners could justify their profits (economically if not ethically) because they dramatically increased the productive capacity of nations and limited starvation and disease. In a communist society, the productive capacity of industry would be so developed that there would no longer be any need for class oppression.

For Marx, a communist society would reverse the role of technology in society. Whereas technology had played a dominant and oppressive role thanks to the shortage of goods, it would now be subsumed within human needs. Marx was consistent in his belief that equality in an economically developed society meant greater freedom of choice. In particular, he believed that technology would usher in a leisure society where individuals had the freedom to develop as humans. So averse was Marx to the development of a technologically determined society that he viewed freedom as the absence of the bureaucracy that accompanies a technologically efficient society. In fact, Marx appears to be naïve by modern standards because he believed that the major form of bureaucracy - the state apparatus - would wither away - in a communist society (definitely not a state!). Human beings would now determine their own future.

It doesn’t matter whether you side with Ellul’s pessimistic view or Marx’s more optimistic interpretation of technology. What is important is that you realize that Ellul and Marx cannot be dismissed as technological determinists in the way that Hughes wants to dismiss them. In many ways, the questions that they deal with are more complex and subtle than Hughes simplistic understanding of technology. Hughes’ theories are based on the study of particular industries rather than these two thinkers much more sophisticated attempt to draw connections between social and technological development. The latter may be technological determinists in some respects, but such an interpretation needs to be qualified by examining the place of technology in their social and political paradigms.

Thus, it is simplistic for Hughes’ to claim that “a technological system can be both a cause and effect; it can shape or be shaped by society.” The deeper question is how, and under what conditions, does technology shape society. Only by understanding the deeper connections will we have any ability to shape technological momentum. Hughes’ has little understanding of the deeper movement of technology and technique. As a result, his analysis of the potential for shaping technological momentum is superficial.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 2 -

Neil Postman is a well-known critic of technology and a person who believes that technology is particularly dangerous because it has become independent of conscious human decision-making. In fact, Postman argues that technology has become deified (i.e. turned into a god). As our new religious symbol, technology wipes out traditional spiritual and moral beliefs, creating a new type of society - a Technopoly.

One of the claims that resides at the heart of modern Technopoly is that it is creating a society based on knowledge. In fact, technopolies continually assume that the ability of modern technology to produce and communicate information represents progress in knowledge. A further implicit assumption is that information is a good thing and that a greater supply of information is liberating both for the individual and society.

Like Leo Marx, Postman wants to claim that both technology and information can only be liberating if they serve a clear social purpose. What makes Postman so interesting is that he suggests that the dissemination of information needs to be controlled

1. Unless information is controlled, argues Postman, it becomes unusable. There is simply too much of it to be processed.
2. 2. Unless information is given a weight and value by those in authority, argues Postman, it has no real legitimacy. Everything is as important as everything else, which results in chaos.
3. 3. Unless information is limited in its ability to flow into social systems it is personally and socially destabilizing. There needs to be a constant balance between the “old and the new, between novelty and tradition” or there will be disorder in minds and social institutions.

Of course, control is something of a dirty word. We’ve all witnessed the disadvantages of the control of information by political regimes, religious cults or self-interested corporations to know that outside information needs to flow into the system. But Postman suggests that this issue of control will always be a problem in any society and he argues that the technological alternative is the loss of cultural literacy and even intellectual meaning.

Postman uses the example of universities. Universities are social institutions that filter and deliver information. University faculties and academic disciplines decide what should be considered valuable or relevant and what should not. That there are problems with this, no one would doubt. For many centuries, Western universities adopted a canon of literary works that excluded many writers of non-Western cultures. Women writers and feminist issues were missing from the curriculum. The university curriculum clearly needs to be reformed from time to time. But that does not mean that anything goes. The alternative to a system that tends to fossilize is an information glut that is chaotic.

Consider, for example, what would happen if departments of science in our universities gave equal time to astrology, dianetics and creationism. Certainly, this is what the defenders of those systems would like to see. The result would be catastrophic. There would be no common framework for doing science. Students would not have any guidance as to what was reliable information and what was not. That is precisely the kind of situation that an uncritical divination of the “information society” implies.

In the humanities and social sciences, of course, a wider variety of theories exists. There are liberal democratic, theological and even critical Marxist perspectives. But the number of meta-theories is not huge. The big theories take a long time to achieve respectability and they are subject to decline - something that has happened to Marxism in recent years. Moreover, while they have power, they provide their adherents with clear guidelines on ways “to weight information and therefore understand events.” As theoretical frameworks decline, believers usually have ample time (i.e. over generations0 to build or adopt new and more relevant frameworks.

What is significant about most of these theories is that they have ethical implications in addition to being a body of social knowledge. Marxists, for example, believes in fairness and equality; the early Marx condemned the injustices of a series of dominant classes. Liberal democrats always valued freedom and independence of thought. Conservatives believe in paternalistic values and the preservation of traditional meanings. All of these theories are “infused with moral content”. Morality allows us to humanize our world.

What the uncritical acceptance of a new “information society” does is to normalize chaos, trivialize knowledge, and problematize ethics. It creates a post modern society wherein information can be processed in any way that the individual wants. Communication between individuals in post-modern societies becomes difficult, if not impossible, because there are few common points of reference. Culture, as a way of processing information, and attaching ethical or spiritual values to information, loses most of its organizing ability.

Technopoly and the information society are dangerous, not only because they remove the social filters through which we evaluate knowledge, but also because they obscure the pernicious tendencies of a technological society. Consider, for example, the belief that knowledge liberates us. The fundamental tendency of a technological society is to elevate efficiency above anything else. If there is a principle at the heart of technology it is efficiency. Efficiency is not about freedom; quite the reverse. Efficiency implies an increase in centralization and the bureaucratization of our lives.

Information can never proliferate totally or the result will be chaos. Our modern, technologically-mediated, information society will need to provide some mechanism for processing knowledge, some mechanism for rationalizing the flow of information. But instead of the cultural or intellectual values that once filtered knowledge, the new guideline will be to ignore, and even eliminate, “all information and ideas that do not contribute to efficiency.” The obvious result will be an increase in bureaucratic controls.

Of course, there have been many traditional bureaucracies, and ancient China boasted one of the largest and most effective. What differentiates modern from earlier bureaucracies is that the latter were designed to “serve social institutions” and values. Modern bureaucracies are becoming “an autonomous meta-institution that largely serves itself.” If we feel that we are being forced to conform to modern bureaucracies, that bureaucracy is our master rather than our servant, our fear is a genuine one. The modern definition of the bureaucrat is frightening - it means “a person who by training, commitment and even temperament is indifferent to both the content and the totality of a human problem.” In other words, modern bureaucrats are statistical number crunchers, or processors of information through forms. They deal with the technical problems of moving information around, not the human issues that may be involved.

Does this sound too harsh? After all, bureaucrats are people too and share a common interest in going what is socially beneficial. While this may be the case, the fact is that most bureaucrats are specialized experts in a particular field. They tend to be ignorant of anything that is not directly related to that field. Certainly, they often lack the credentials to evaluate the ethical, social or cultural implications of their work. Consider, however, that these experts have enormous power over our lives and that the implications of what they do, and only they understand, is often quite profound. Now consider also that these experts operate in a world where, while bureaucracy is increasing, traditional social institutions and values are declining. Finally, consider that the decline in traditional values is being speeded up by the production of “a torrent of information” (often produced by the bureaucrats themselves) that makes it impossible “for anyone to possess more than a tiny fraction of the sum total of human knowledge.”

Postman has painted a disturbing picture of technology and the information society where there is nothing between us and chaos but a bureaucracy bent on efficiency. But he doesn’t stop there. He also points out the dangers inherent in bureaucratic specialization. Bureaucracy means the specialization of functions and the creation of experts. We can see just how bureaucratized our modern world has become by the number of supposed experts who are running it. We used to have experts in only a few specialized scientific or technical fields. Now we have experts in education, law, family life and personal maladjustment. We even have experts “in child-rearing and lovemaking and friend-making.”

Everything is becoming technologized for the sake of efficiency, even where standardization and bureaucracy are patently non-sensical, such as the measurement of a person’s IQ. As if something as complex as an individual’s intelligence can be measured by a score on a test. But that is precisely what Technopoly does. It re-invents and measures everything in its own image. As I said in an earlier lecture, that image is not human. As Postman puts it:

Their god speaks of efficiency, precision, objectivity. And that is why such concepts as sin and evil (i.e. human ethical and social values) disappear in Technopoly. They come from a moral universe that is irrelevant to the theology of expertise…Sin and evil disappear because they cannot be measured and objectified, and therefore cannot be dealt with by experts.

Postman wants us all to consider whether a Technopoly is really the kind of society that we want to live in. For him, knowledge is hardly liberating when it is processed by experts in the interest of a non-human efficiency. He wants to return to a time when human history was driving technology and not the other way around.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Teich, Ch. 1 -

The Enlightenment is often thought of as the period when the modern idea of progress was born. Enlightened thinkers believed that an understanding of the laws of nature and human nature - in other words science - could liberate humanity and reform our lives for the better. Some went so far as to envision utopias and even the perfectibility of man through the “mastery of nature.”

But this belief in science had some qualifications in the eighteenth-century. Believers in the benefits of science and technology did not typically elevate these above national freedom and individual development. Science and technology were considered to be servants of humanity, and not ends in themselves. Some of the effects of improved technology - such as the factory system - could even be considered inimical to human development.

For example, in The Wealth of Nations, Adam Smith praised the division of labour in the pin factory as a remarkable development that increased production exponentially. But he also claimed that the labouring classes who would be subject to this division of labour would be mentally impoverished and even alienated from their work. To restore the mental health of workers, Smith went so far as to argue that the state should provide them with education. This education was anything but job related; the concept of education was to broaden the mind of workers, to compensate for their mundane work, and to allow them to become human beings and citizens.

Thus, new technology could be double-edged. Because technology only improved the material conditions of life, it needed to be subservient to more human and political needs. This recognition was held by yet another enlightened thinker, Thomas Jefferson, who argued that America should remain a fundamentally agrarian (i.e. agricultural) economy. This, of course, meant having to trade with industrializing countries for finished commodities and represented a drain on the U.S. treasury. But Jefferson thought that it was more important to have mentally healthy citizens with a good “overall quality of life” than to pay the price of industrial development, including an urban proletariat and middle class who lacked the independence of people who owned or worked on the land.

In a similar fashion, Benjamin Franklin went against a fundamental principle of technology in capitalism, and showed us the bigger picture of the enlightenment, when he refused to take out patents (i.e. to profit) from his inventions. The purpose of technology was not to enrich the individual but to improve the overall quality of life for everyone. Technological progress in the eighteenth-century, in other words, was submerged in and subservient to social and political values.

In America, the ideal of technological progress, and the marriage of technology and capitalism, appears to have occurred sometime in the 1840s. Daniel Webster, a senator from Massachusetts, was different from the aristocratic/agrarian philosophy of Thomas Jefferson. He was a champion of the urban middle class, the kind of people who built and managed factories. This group equated the advance of civilization with a kind of technological progress that was divorced from earlier intellectual and political aspirations. In Webster’s writings and speeches, the technological sublime begins to take shape. Technology is equated with progress, and progress is identified with unbridled capitalism. Profitability and progress now, for the first time, go hand in hand.

The Websters of the Western world, of course, did have things much their own way. But the Jeffersonian perspective did not die out. It had its locus in the older politically independent agrarian community whose values helped to shape young America. It resurfaced in Henry Thoreau’s elevation of nature over the machine in writings like Walden. It was embodied in the literary critique of industrialization - particularly the railway - in the writings of Emerson, Hawthorne and Melville. Against technology, American writers idealized the purity of the wilderness.

But such ideas, in Great Britain (Carlyle, Coleridge and Wordsworth) and Germany (Kant, Fichte and Herder) as well as America, these ideas were not dominant. They represented a defensive, adversary culture that could be easily dismissed as romantic or unrealistic. It was only during the twentieth century, especially during the 1960s, that this adversary culture began to attract a wider body of adherents. The hippy movement was the beginning of a growing movement that held the concept of technological progress up to the light of serious scrutiny. This critique can be seen in: the anti-nuclear movement, environmentalism, zero growth formulates, alternative technologies and a host of loosely connected movements. At the popular level, it is embodied in a host of new age philosophies and perspectives that, while often superficial, at least demonstrate the growing disillusionment with the idea and reality of technocracy.

More and more, people have begun to question this belief that technology will solve all human problems and to demand that technology serve a social purpose. This new attitude sets strict limits to technological progress in terms of political, community and cultural goals. What people want is to “make rational and humane choices among alternative technologies”. A naïve belief in technological progress is being replaced by a more questioning attitude. It is not that we no longer believe in progress, we are simply asking the question progress towards what.

Such a questioning attitude is not universal. In countries like China, and certainly in parts of the developing world, technology is still viewed a saviour in its own right. These countries have such a desire to imitate the wealth and power of the West that they tend to be blind to the problems associated with technological development. Many of the inhabitants of Western countries, however, have witnessed a deterioration in the overall quality of their lives as result of technology. Their faith in technological progress has been weakened (but certainly not shattered) by the obvious problems that technology brings in its wake.

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/

- Robins and Webster, Ch. 4 -

Introduction

In this lecture, I want to stress the dialogic nature of technological development in society or, to put it another way, the social imbeddedness of technology. You’ve probably noticed how difficult it is for writers on the history of technology to avoid reifying their subject. Technological and scientific discovery become the engine that societies follow, or do not follow, at their peril. That’s why it’s so important to assert that all technology is a human creation and that technological development implies choice. What works for one society or culture, may not work for another. What works for one class in society may not suit another.

The issue of technological progress was engaged in the nineteenth century, when people believed that the railway was the symbol of progress. It was reasserted during the twentieth century when nuclear energy was going to transform the world. But never has technology been placed in such a firm and inescapable driver’s seat than in the present, where we have placed Information Technology (IT) or Information and Communications Technology (ICT) at the controls.

Inevitability and Utopia

The individual writer who is most often referred to in connection with the new society is Marshall MacLuhan. As you probably know, his most famous statement was “the medium is the message.” In other words, new communication techniques were going to be the dominant features in our life. Thus, MacLuhan and his followers were technological inevitabilists. Anyone who critiqued the new technology and its effects was compared to someone who would have condemned books to be burned after Guttenberg started to mass-produce them. The other characteristic of MacLuhan and his followers is that, in addition to suggesting that there was no escape from new technologies, that the general tendency of these technologies was progressive. MacLuhan, for instance, suggested that new communication technologies would turn the world into a “global village.”

The global network was not only inevitable but it had the characteristics that are usually attached to utopian thinking. This combination among propagandists for technology has achieved the status of an ideology. It is difficult to escape it in the media, in everyday conversation, and even at university. In fact, some of the most uncritical proponents of technology teach at York University. Their thinking is characterized by the following:

1. A deep belief that a technological revolution is taking place and that those nations and individuals who don’t keep up with technological progress will suffer the fate of the dinosaurs.
2. That those who will have the most power in the brave new world will be those knowledge workers or symbolic analysts that can adapt to the proliferation of knowledge. Those employers who do not systematically recognize and promote knowledge workers will become the dinosaurs of capitalism.
3. That the new society dominated by knowledge workers will allow much greater flexibility, individual choice and freedom - but only for those who embrace the new technology.

The style of discussion and debate that the proponents of IT and ITC adopt is not without certain contradictions. On the one hand, they criticize old systems of learning and producing as doomed to extinction; but they often take on the posture of defenders of an imperiled technological society from the forces of apathy and tradition. Second, while they argue that future belongs to those who can play creatively and purposefully with the information provided by new technologies; they demonstrate an unhealthy preoccupation with the mechanics and minutiae of technology that constantly results in wasteful and mind numbing learning. Finally, they condemn those who would presume to critique the use of IT or ICT as anachronistic Luddites, but they invoke concepts like the global village or the electronic cottage or the Internet community in ways that sound very much like a return to preindustrial values.

The Social Embeddedness of Technology

Despite their praise of symbolic analysts, most commentators on IT or ICT evidence the analytical skills of chipmunk. One reason for their lack of depth is their noticeable lack of imagination, perhaps the result of their childlike and essentially passive acceptance of technological utopias and virtual realities. Another, and more serious problem, is their lack of history. Technophones seem to forget that similar claims were made by the proponents of every new technology. When the leaders of India invested in nuclear power during the 1950s and 1960s, leaving their nation further behind than ahead, they also invoked the inevitability of industrial progress. An earlier parallel was the praise of the modern factory as the ideal working environment and blending of man and machine by Andrew Ure in The Philosophy of Manufactures.

What really happens in terms of technological progress is that human beings make choices, some of them are successful and some of them are not. Technology has never fulfilled the dreams of its promoters, but continual promotion has allowed technology to become an evolutionary force. Of all the writers on technology, only one has ever made a good intellectual case for its character of inevitability, and he was a writer who believed that the prognosis for technology was anything but optimistic. Max Weber argued that technological progress was merely a continuation of bureaucratic rationalization in the west that would inevitably put people into its own self-referential iron cage.

But the history of industrialization suggests that there is nothing inevitable or even predictable about technological choices. The development of the factory system occurred in a capitalistic marketplace that claimed to correspond to the laws of our economic nature. But that did not stop governments and communities from quickly creating all kinds of regulations, laws and background institutions to keep factories and machine production from destroying society. Technological dialogue since the Industrial Revolution suggests that many societies adopt technologies in their own way and adapt technology to their culture.

On the surface, it would appear that no society embraced new technologies more whole-heartedly than the Japanese. But even a superficial understanding of Japan’s most technological corporations shows the dominating role played by traditional concepts of loyalty and inter-group consensus. A more problematic historical example is the way that nuclear technology has been adopted by a number of countries to serve a military function. Even in present day America, technological development proceeds hand in hand with militaristic ideals.

What the reification of technology does is to obscure the social embeddedness of technology. In particular, it obscures the power of the very small economic elite who control the mode of technological production in Western society. The debate on new technology has difficulty dealing with the ways that technological development accelerates the differences between the have and have not nations, as well as the gravitation of wealth into fewer and fewer hands in the advanced companies. Moreover, the so-called silicon revolution conveniently created a few new members of the elite, thereby obscuring the predominant tendency towards the consolidation of wealth.

In terms of capitalist ideology, the new silicon society performed a similar function to the self-made men of the Industrial Revolution. In both cases, the numbers of the newly arrived were few. In both cases, continued hegemony was achieved, not through creative innovation, but the deployment of capital and the creation of cartels. Every technological revolution creates a small space for social mobility, but what is interesting is just how small that space is and just how quickly it closes.

The peons to technology - and the simplistic equation between creativity and success in the silicon city - obscures the continuing importance of class and colonialism. The glorification of individuals like Bill Gates, in spite of widespread proof of mimicking the creativity of earlier pioneers and establishing an unfair monopoly, can only be attributed to the need that people have to believe in the power of technology to change the world and society for the better. There may be elements in technology that allow for social improvement, but that improvement is neither autonomous nor inevitable.

The Silicon Revolution Reconsidered

The Industrial Revolution was a true revolution, not in the sense that it broke completely with the technological developments of the past. Clearly, it didn’t as most of the current research demonstrates. But it was a social revolution in that capitalists required people to completely change their habits and to conform to the new division of labour that blurred the distinction between man and machine.

The Technological Revolution is much more of an evolution. Despite the increased rapidity of change, we are moving along a more well defined social trajectory. This trajectory can be divided into the following elements:

1. Information Society: We have been involved in an information society ever since educational institutions were constructed that ensured universal or near universal literacy in the West.
2. Increasing Professionalism: The so-called intellectual workers of the future may need to be highly-self reflective, even more so than the past, but even the most optimistic estimates of this group put it no higher than 30% of the population. If so, this is just a continuation of the ever-increasing specialization of a sector of all advanced societies.
3. Increased World of Choice: The choice only applies to those people who are clever. Generally, these are also the people with the most education. The fact that they are not always one and the same merely shows that freedoms are decided, not by those who think outside of the box, but by those who control the direction of capitalism.
4. Increased Quality and Variety of Consumer Goods: If ever there was a tendency that corresponded to the need on the part of capitalism to increase consumption, it is the emphasis on new and higher quality products. This is a capitalist tendency, not an isolated technological development.
5. An Emphasis on Theory and Flexibility Rather than Specialization: Now this is an interesting development, although it could be argued that this concept is nothing new but was included in the thinking of E.W. Taylor and the advocates of scientific management and specialization from the beginning. To the extent that the emphasis on theory is a new development, however, it hardly supports techno-enthusiasm. The new theorists are inclined to view everything as connected and not to differentiate technology to a distinct MacLuhanesque sphere. An example of the new theoreticians would be those environmentalists who talk about sustainability and the interdependence of ecosystems.

Techno-Boosterism

Techno-enthusiasm may have captured the imagination of the media and a small group of technophones. Arguably, these attitudes have not spread to the general population who, increasingly, are not rushing out to purchase the latest techno gadget and whose spending is pouring cold water on those who view the computer as an agent of revolution. Fortunately, the mass of the people is not so easily deluded by the claims of the technology enthusiasts, whose capacity for jumping on and off the technological bandwagon merits serious psychological investigation.

The biggest problem among those who do not buy into the technological revolution is their apathy. They fall into the trap of technological inevitability to the extent that they are incapable of seeing other alternative modes of discourse. In Times of the Technoculture, Robins and Webster are concerned, not only to attack the logic of IT and ITC, but also to show that our technological society is “malleable and the outcome of human decisions.” For them, it is the “market system” that should be the focus of evaluation and not simply technology.

Robins and Webster suggest that it is a mistake to think that we live in a post-capitalist society that will be run by information experts of symbolic analysts. For them, the corporation of the past looks a lot like the corporation of the future. The global village is dominated by a small group of capitalists from the advanced capitalist nations. The potential for choice is limited to a small group, and it is far from inalienable. It only survives to the extent that it meets the perceived needs of organized capital.

There might be many other kinds of sociological critiques of techno-enthusiasm that the left wing orientation of Robins and Webster. But their essential Marxist critique at least demonstrates that there are alternatives to techno delusion.

A Brief Analysis of the ‘Information Revolution’

Many academics and others regard the development of IT and ICT as an Information Revolution that will transform our lives. Many others believe that this revolution will be inherently progressive and democratic. Such interpretations relate to a belief that knowledge and its collection are neutral activities.

Elements of this revolutionary interpretation suggest a complete rupture with the past, as exemplified by certain shifts from:

1. centralization to decentralization,
2. market averaging to market segmenting,
3. concentration of information to dispersal of information,
4. rigid organization towards greater fluidity and flexibility based on state-of-the art information.

These developments relating to the mobilization of information and communication resources have a longer history, however, that cannot be understood if one focuses on what is immediate or apparently revolutionary.

In Times of the Technoculture, Robins and Webster want to critically examine these assumptions historically. By looking at knowledge access, gathering and dissemination prior to the spread of computers and digital information, they claim to detect a longer term pattern of information gathering that relates to two distinct purposes that are anything but neutral:

1. the efficient management of organizations and social planning,
2. the more effective surveillance and control of employees, groups, national populations and, eventually, the global community.

If we believe that knowledge is individually beneficial and socially progressive, and that IT/ICT is qualitatively different than anything that has come before, we will obscure the dark side of the so-called information revolution. An analysis of the dark side suggests that information is being gathered and progresses by certain groups in order to more efficiently control others. Moreover, a characteristic of this information gathering and dissemination is to deny the possibility of public debate over issues.

Robins and Webster would certainly agree that some features of the Information Revolution are unique. The technological character, pace and range of information gathering eclipse anything that went on in the past. But the pattern was established during the 1870s and that pattern can be seen in everything that has happened to knowledge gathering ever since.

Scientific Management

The starting point for the new information society was established in the Scientific Management movement that was spearheaded by Frederick Winslow Taylor and that created a new and more effective kind of managerial capitalism. By the 1870s, those who were in control of American business were growing increasingly frustrated with classical market ideology. The premise of the capitalist marketplace was the marriage of supply and demand in a competitive marketplace. Prior to this time, capital investment and social progress were thought to be effected by Adam Smith’s hidden hand.

Taylor and others knew better. They proposed the idea of the efficiently managed corporation and industrial systems that were controlled, not by anything as unpredictable as competition, but by vertical integration of large enterprises. Vertical integration meant two things: 1) a hierarchical chain of command run by managers who were the brains of the corporation, and 2) complete control over the production process from the supply of raw materials, the velocity of production, and the final distribution of the goods produced. Vertical integration meant that the managers - those with specialized knowledge - basically dictated what employees were to do. The tasks were routinized and made more efficient through time-and-motion studies.

The interesting thing about this knowledge transformation is that it involved little in the way of technology. Technology was still confined to the machinery of the plant (the new name, since the old factories were now considered to be inefficient). The precise routines of the machinery subordinated the human workers while the managers achieved greater control as the planners of the operation. The planning function was based on their superior brain power and their specialized knowledge. The goal of this separation of intellect and labour was greater production through efficiency. Efficiency itself came to be viewed as the apotheosis of rationalism.

The fascinating thing about Taylorism or Scientific Management was its open-endedness. Scientific Management was too big an idea to be confined to business. It soon developed into a social philosophy. Governments began to see the need for greater brain power and the need to have trained experts or civil servants who could engage in state planning. Most of the participants in the Scientific Management movement were originally engineers; hence the term social engineers (later technocrats) that came to be applied to those who felt that society would function more effectively if it was run by those with superior knowledge who also appreciated the requirement for efficiency. Society itself now was seen as a complex machine, far too complex to be left in the hands of amateurs or citizens

The Statistical Revolution

Originally, Scientific Management focused on the concepts of efficient systems or machines. The planning function of management, however, demanded a much broader statistical framework. Vertically integrated organizations soon found that, while they could increase production significantly by eliminating waste, tightening operations, and developing economies of scale, they still had a problem figuring out what goods would sell and distributing them to customers.

Usually overshadowed by F.W. Taylor, another management guru by the name of Harrington Emerson (1853-1931) also focused on the specialized planning function of managers. But Emerson and his followers also argued that expert planning by specialists required better statistics on which to base decisions. Thus, by the early twentieth century, a statistical revolution was in full swing, and the information was sought after by both corporations and governments to assist them in planning. Terms like business biometrics entered the English language as the very first examples of a revolutionary approach to gathering and applying information.

With the application of statistical theory and method to management, we can truly say that an information revolution was already in full swing by 1911. That revolution intensified between and following the two world wars as capitalism entered a new phase. That phase was the development of a consumer society, which depended heavily on the “collection, aggregation, and dissemination of information.” In order to create a consumer marketplace, the quantitative study and analysis of human behaviour is imperative. The information is used in two ways: 1) to detect the existing needs and patterns of consumption of individuals and groups; 2) to develop marketing and advertising that will appeal to these individuals and groups and thereby allow businesses to sell them new products. A range of new techniques (not yet technologies) were used to obtain this information. These included market research, census data, opinion polls, social science and psychological techniques, and self-conscious propaganda.

Without an already existing information society, a consumer society would have been inconceivable. Therefore, a knowledge society existed long before IT and ITC. Moreover, the characteristics of the earlier information society included the surveillance and control of human beings for economic purposes. The entire point of advertising and marketing in general is to instill new needs, to alter existing values and to train people to act as consumers. In many respects, the information revolution was already well established prior to the introduction of computers, satellites, telecommunications and the so-called global village.

A Critical Approach to the New Communications Technologies

It is certainly true that the new information and communications technologies greatly increase the reach and power of those who control them. It is often presumed that these technologies are neutral and can be used for any variety of purposes, including ones that are democratic. After all, the World Wide Web, once it divorced itself from its militaristic origins, appeared to function as a highly egalitarian vehicle for sharing information.

More recent developments should make us reconsider such naïve assessments. Those who are “promoting and annexing cable systems, communications satellites, telecommunications links, computer resources” etc. are those who want to manipulate us in order to make profits. All of these information and communications technologies are converging in ways that assist the greater segmentation and control of the economic marketplace. Computer cookies can easily log you and your family’s personal preferences. Computer scanners can tell companies what products you like. Credit and bank cards provide access to detailed financial histories.

We should not think that these technologies are only the tools of those looking to manipulate us for profit. These same tools, ranging from statistics to individual profiles, have long been in the hands of governments. Consider, for example, public opinion polls, which are scientifically accurate to within 2%. Arguably, these statistical tools prevent democratic debate on important topics and allow governments greater control for managing the public perception.

The Shrinking of the Public Sphere

Some political scientists have argued that modern life is so complex, and politics is so managed by experts, that the possibility of a public debate or forum no longer exists. The transformation is one in which the public sphere has been “superseded, managed and manipulated by large organizations which arrange things among themselves on the basis of technical information and their relative power positions.” In other words, technicians and bureaucrats now run our lives.

The change from capitalism to corporatism involves an entirely new definition of reason. Early capitalism, and early democracy, were founded on the notion that every individual is capable of making rational choices and should be given the freedom to make those choices independently. The appeal is to the reason of the individual and the individual person. In a corporate and bureaucratic society, the individual’s reason and interests need to be managed for the greater interest of society. It is society that must be rationally organized. The guiding principle for social and corporate rationality is efficiency.

Efficiency requires technique, but it does not require technology. The modern IT and ICT technologies, however, speed up and broaden the progress towards greater efficiency. The rationalistic and technocratic principle always runs into the problem of opposition from human elements. While it is relatively easy to control the workplace, it has been much more difficult to penetrate other aspects of individual and group life that have been notoriously independent.

The new communications technologies and strategies allow much deeper penetrations of individuals and groups at all levels. They are a much more sophisticated nervous system for corporations and governments. They operate on a global scale and they can transcend many of the historical barriers of time and space. What the historical pattern suggests is that these new technologies will not develop new communities or more knowledgeable democracies. Instead, they will provide those who have controlled us with greater information and the ability to control us more.

At the end of the day, the rationalist principle inherent in Scientific Management and its successors, points to more not less social engineering. If Robins and Webster are correct, then the impulse towards efficiency may eventually dominate human life even in the absence of “money or weapons”. At least this is what likely will happen if we remain blind to the “histories of reason, knowledge and technology.”

Some Notes on Cybernetic Imagination

1. Technology as the mobilization of society
   • Factory and economic discipline
   • F.W. Taylor and Ford - logic of the machine
   • Spread to external world - consumerism
   • State bureaucracy reinforces capitalist bureaucracy
   • Time and tasks spread to external world
   • Privatization and marginalization of everyday life
2. Net result of these developments
   • Self-mobilization for capitalist goals
   • The decline of public life
   • The end of ‘counter mobilizations’
3. The Information Society and the World Brain
   • Increase in variety for 20% of population - ‘symbolic analysts’
   • Deskilling of positions for everyone else
   • Ability to monitor employee behaviour, even at home
4. Running Together of Work and Leisure in Oppressive way
   • Creation of ever more ‘flexible’ workers, who even adjust to contracts
   • Employment invades private sphere
   • Free time subordinated and interfered with
   • Time and tasks of consumer and worker divided into pellets - nicks of time
5. Increasing Control From the Centre
   • Permanent power grid
   • Statistical information on individuals
   • Knowledge of preferences, friends, choices - i.e. music clubs
   • State/police/corporate knowledge
   • Information as commodity - most essential information out of hands of normal users
   • Convergence of technologies allows greater controls
6. The New Panopticon
   • No longer physical but electronic
   • Idea is to be able to see anyone at any time
   • Because people can be seen, they act as though they are always being seen
   • True privacy is thing of the past

The notes presented here are for the AK NATS 1760.06 “Science, Technology and Society” course offered in the Fall/Winter Semester of 2001/2002 by the Atkinson College of York University, Toronto, Canada and taught by John Dwyer. The lectures are based on the following texts:

1. Martin Bridgstock et al, Science, Technology and Society: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press, 1998), ISBN 0-521-58735-2
2. Kevin Robbins and Frank Webster, Times of the Technoculture: From the Information Society to the Virtual Life (New York, Routledge, 1999), ISBN 0-415-16115-0
3. Albert H. Teich, Technology and the Future (New York, St. Martin’s Press, 2000), ISBN 0-312-01885-1

For more about John Dwyer, visit: http://www.sayitagain.com/ivorytower/