Matt Hern and Stu Chaulk point out, with
reference to my article on science and technology (D&N, vol
4 no 1, pp. 54-86), that:
Takis is surely correct when he writes
"... a democratic science and technology presupposes an
inclusive democracy" but the reverse is entirely true as
well... A democratic science and technology and a
democratic society require one another.
Of course, I would have no objection to agree
with the part of the above statement which affirms that a
democratic science and technology (i.e. one controlled by
the body of citizens) and a democratic society require one
another. In fact, I allotted almost twenty per cent of the
space allocated to my article (pp 80-86) to an analysis of
the characteristics of a democratic science and technology,
which I see as a necessary component of an inclusive
democracy. However, the authors go a step further and,
starting from the fact that ―as they stress―
some tools are worth preserving and might potentially be of
use to a genuinely democratic society, they attempt to put
forward ‘a view of technology and society in dialectic
relationship with one another, suggesting that democratic
tools and a democratic society rely on one another for their
emergence’. But, the fact that some of the present tools are
worth preserving in a democratic society (a point I also
stressed in my article —see pp. 82-83) does not mean that a
democratic technology could emerge within the present
undemocratic society. The view that the democratic, or
alternatively, authoritarian nature of tecnology is the
outcome of some inherent characteristics of technology is
not compatible with the democratic project which sees the
nature of technology determined by the power relations
implied by the socio–economic framework and the associated
dominant social paradigm. Classical libertarian thought has
also been in agreement with this view of the nature of
technology. If therefore the authors agree with this view
then the emergence of a democratic technology, within an
undemocratic society like the present one, is an
impossibility. In this sense, although it is true that ‘a
democratic science and technology and a democratic society
require one another’ and that ‘a democratic science and
technology presupposes an inclusive democracy’, the reverse,
contrary to what the authors state, is definitely not true.
In other words, it is the change in power relations that
would lead to a change in technology towards a democratic
technology and not vice versa.
So, the real issue is not whether I recognise
the interaction between a democratic society and a
democratic science and technology (which obviously I do) but
whether a democratic science and technology can emerge
within the present institutional framework or not. The
thesis I tried to support was that a democratic science and
technology cannot emerge in an institutional framework of
concentration of political and economic power, like the one
created by the present institutional framework of the market
economy and representative democracy. Still, although the
authors seem to agree on this point (‘fundamentally, we do
not believe that a democratic science and technology can
exist for long within a capitalist society’), they seem to
contradict it when they stress that:
We are, however, insisting that
social and cultural criteria be used to evaluate
new tools and their effects on the deepest and most
valuable aspects of human relationships. We are
insisting that the insatiable need for speed exemplified
by the automobile and Internet be carefully limited and
that the social degradation virtuality carries with it
be resisted.
But, unless the authors believe that the
emergence of a democratic science and technology is not
impossible within a capitalist society, what is the point of
discussing criteria to evaluate new tools? Just to find out
in advance which ones we shall preserve in a future society?
Furthermore, what is the point of their call to limit the
need for speed (exemplified by the automobile and internet)?
Do they really believe that this is possible in present
society, with no change in power relations and structures,
as the wishful thinking of mainstream Greens implies?
In fact, the authors show a further sign of
confusion on the matter when they characterise as a
‘chicken-and-egg argument’ the crucial question whether it
is the market economy which is the root cause of our
social/ecological crises, or, instead, the current
industrialism or technology. But, it is the answer to this
crucial question which defines the difference between the
deep ecology viewpoint, which sees the industrial culture as
the main cause of the present crisis, the environmentalist
viewpoint, which blames the wrong technologies, and a
libertarian viewpoint, like the one supported by the
Inclusive Democracy project, according to which it is the
system of the market economy that is the ultimate
cause of the crisis and not the industrial culture,
science and technology which represent only the
effects of the system’s logic and dynamic.
This is because it is the former which
conditions, in a decisive way, the present culture, science
and technology and not the other way round. In other words,
while it is true that it was the rise of the market economy
system and its dynamic which led to the present type of
industrial culture, as well as the kind of technologies we
use and the form of institutions we have (WTO etc), the
opposite is not true. But, this is obviously not clear to
the authors when on the one hand they declare (correctly)
that technology is not neutral and that ‘the root cause of
the ecological crisis is capitalism’ and in the same
sentence they stress (incorrectly) that:
at the edge of the millennium, the logic of growth and
its technologies are indistinguishable: they are one
and the same. Global village logic, colonialism, the
death of democracy, the peril of community, the rise of
virtuality... these cannot be separated easily. They
feed and build on one another. The Internet is to
communicative life what globalisation and the WTO are to
economic life. They are part and parcel of the same
process, the same logic and they rely on each other to
flourish.
However, to maintain that the market economy, the logic of
growth and its technologies are ‘one and the same’, simply
confuses causes and effects. Furthermore, this is not just
an ‘academic’ issue, as the authors seem to believe, because
unless we know what the causes of the crisis are we cannot
act to reverse them. This means, (and this is a crucial
point to be stressed because it seems many anarchists today
are not clear about it!), that the goal of a liberatory
project today cannot just be to fight against the effects of
the present socio-economic system (i.e. the institutions
―like
the WTO―
and technologies used, as well as the associated culture)
―as
if a different set of institutions and technologies were
feasible within the present institutional framework. The
crucial point which characterises today a political project
as a liberatory or a reformist one is whether its goal is
respectively to challenge the system of the market economy
itself or just its symptoms. Although fighting the symptoms
of this system (together with mainstream Greens, liberals,
social democrats etc), rather than the system itself, makes
life easier for radical activists, such a stand does not
help at all in creating a radical consciousness about the
systemic causes of the crisis. And, I cannot see any other
major objective for a liberatory movement in today’s world
of utter confusion than to help in the development of such a
radical consciousness, which is the necessary precondition
for a systemic change.