Technokratische Bewegung

The technocratic movement was a popular social movement in the United States during the 1920s and 1930s, which advocated a form of society where the welfare of human beings is optimized by means of scientific analysis, a government system based on competence, and widespread use of technology. Although the movement is not as popular today, it still exists as Technocracy Inc., the members of which partake in discussion groups and publish quarterly magazines.

History

Howard Scott started the Technocratic movement as the Technical Alliance in the winter of 1918-1919. The Technical Alliance, composed of mostly scientists and engineers, started an energy survey of the North American continent near the beginning of the 20th century. Many of their conclusions gave a scientific background upon which they based their ideas for a new social structure. In 1933, the group became incorporated in the state of New York as a non-profit, non-political, non-sectarian organization known as Technocracy Incorporated. Led by Scott, then director-in-chief (his organizational title was "Chief Engineer"), the organization promoted its goals with a North American lecture tour in 1934, gaining support throughout the depression years.

The organization's magazines, The Northwest Technocrat and Technocracy Digest, are still published today and the movement still continues after more than 70 years of history. One of the most notable members of the movement was M. King Hubbert, a geophysicist who proposed the theory which has become known as the Hubbert Peak or peak oil.

The standard unit for the organization is the chartered Section, consisting of at least fifty members. At Technocracy's height in popularity, many cities contained more than one Section, sometimes as high as a dozen or more. These sections would be the organs that undertook the majority of Technocracy's work, including the research that continued after the Technical Alliance.

The organization receives its funds entirely from dues and donations from its members. Membership is open to any citizen of North America, save politicians, as Technocracy is not a political party, but moreover seeks the abolishment of political controls.

Technocracy's Continental Headquarters (CHQ) was originally situated in New York. It has moved several times through its history, and is currently located in Ferndale, Washington.

Ideas and goals

The Technocratic movement aims to establish a socio-economic system known as technocracy, which is based upon abundance, as opposed to scarcity-based economic systems like capitalism and the system used by Communist states. A core conclusion reached by the Technocratic movement is that a price system, or any system based on scarcity, is an illogical means of distribution in the technologically advanced world in which humans live today. Technocracy sees established economic, political and administrative forms as relics of a traditional past. The group says scientific observations and reasoning prove that a technate is an optimal social structure.

Datei:Technocracy graph1.jpg

Trends of the price system with technologic escalation.

Technocrats argue that developments in mechanization have caused a massive shift of employment towards the service sector. Further increases in efficiency and productivity mean that most of the tasks performed by human employees could be reduced or eliminated through better management, automation, and centralization. These trends should signal an increase in both production possibilities and leisure time, since more and more can be produced with less and less human labor. Within a market-price system, however, increased productivity often leads to loss of jobs and lay-offs because companies need less workers, and lower wages because of competition between workers. The standard of living falls for many or only rises minimally. Thus, Technocrats argue that we are faced with a fundamental paradox: As inexpensive machines become available to replace human labor, they do not make our lives easier; on the contrary, they make them harder. The more we are capable of producing due to technology, the greater the disparities in wealth will become and the potential benefit of technology will be shared less. The basic cause of this problem, in the view of the Technocratic movement, is the fact that we rely on a money-based price system to make economic decisions.

As opposed to economists, who define efficiency in terms of full utilization of resources in a way that provides the most utility to their owners, Technocrats define efficiency in terms of empirical evidence. Efficiency for a Technocrat is measured scientifically: a ratio of energy applied for useful work to energy applied in the complete system. Technocrats argue there exists a massive rift between the real world of science and the world of economics. They claim the inputs needed to make most products are in abundance, especially those critical to society's needs like food, shelter, transportation, information, etc. Technocrats argue that most social ills, such as poverty and hunger are due to faulty economics and improper use of technology. They frequently point out that the current price system is wasteful as it utilizes as many resources as possible but can only create scarce products (excludable and rival private goods). Technocrats argue that full use of our technology and resources should be able to produce an abundance. Thus, in assuming an abundance is possible, Technocrats are at odds with the basic economic principle of the infinitude of human wants. The group also promotes conservation and sustainable production.

Technocrats claim that the price system entails a severe lack of purchasing power, and has been propped up by wasteful tactics, major patches to the economic system, and increasingly huge amounts of debt, which began to increase exponentially after 1930. This debt includes the United States national debt, mortgages (see global debt), long term debt, credit debt, and the growing stock market; all things that would have caused severe inflation in the old world economies where products were naturally scarce, but in the present, they say this debt causes minimal inflation and is used to boast economic growth. Technocrats claim that the price system will eventually fail because of its contradictions with the real world, in which case the movement plans to have educated enough of the populace in order to peaceably make changes to the economic structure and create a technate.

Design of a technate

Division of social and technical decision

Technocracy holds that social decisions will be made by a democratically-elected leader. The democratic side of technocracy does not deal with physical or scientific decisions. Instead, leaders would deal with moral issues, the design of the technate’s flag, etc.

The economy will also be controlled democratically. The population of the technate would go about their business as consumers, spending their energy credits as they see fit at conveniently located distribution centers or through online catalogues. This would be the democracy in action; all citizens decide what they want produced and what to consume. Technocracy aims to be the most direct, feasible, and practical form of control of consumption.

Labour utilization: shortening of the work day

According to M. King Hubbert Vorlage:Fact, the relation between labour and production is:

nl=mq

where:

q is the number of units produced per year
m is the number of hours per worker needed to make a unit
l is the number of hours per worker per year
n is the number of workers

The number of units produced per year should equal the number of units demanded per year. Thus, q may be considered constant in this equation since it cannot be affected by the other variables (it is determined by demand, while this equation refers to supply). Advancing technology, which increases productivity, allows the time needed to produce a unit, m, to decrease. The number of workers is dependent on employment and population growth; it is desirable to have full employment, and population growth will generally be greater than or equal to zero. Thus n will be increasing slowly or remaining constant.

With m decreasing, n increasing slowly or remaining constant and q being a constant in this equation, the variable l must be decreased to balance the equation. In other words, increased productivity will allow the total number of hours of work per year to decrease. In a market system, this causes unemployment. In a technate, this would allow all citizens to work less and have more leisure time while continuing to enjoy better and better living standards.

Elimination of money: The era of Energy Accounting

Technocrats state that technology should be used for humankind's benefit. Under the price system, if a factory that employed 300 workers fully automates itself and only one employee is needed to inspect the machinery, workers are laid off and the amount of money going to consumers drops, as shown by trends in productivity and real wages. Technocrats argue that technology should reduce the burden of human toil in the populace, and technological displacement should result in a significant reduction of working hours. Money and the price system, however, stand in the way.

An energy credit is a hypothetical unit of currency used in a technate. Unlike traditional money, energy credits cannot be saved or earned, only distributed evenly among a populace. The amount of credit given to each citizen would be calculated by determining the total productive capacity of the technate and dividing it equally. The reason for the use of energy credits is to ensure equality among the technate's citizenry as well as prohibit spending that is beyond the productive capacity of the technocracy. This system is usually referred to as energy accounting.

Technocrats are quick to point out that energy accounting is not rationing; it is a way to distribute an abundance and track demand. It would be similar to giving every person on the continent a full income; even though everyone receives equality in terms of the energy they get, it does not matter because everyone gets an abundance (i.e. far more than they need). Technocrats predict that at today's rates of energy conversion, no person will rationally be able to spend all their energy credits. Things that cost a great deal of money in the current price system do not actually take a great deal of energy to produce.

Urbanates: Technocratic Replacement for Cities

Once a technate has been established, the technocratic movement believes that it should proceed to construct an entirely new form of living environments called Urbanates. An Urbanate is essentially an assembly of buildings (or perhaps one large building) in which approximately 14,000 people will live and work. These places would have all the facilities needed for a community, including schools, hospitals, distribution centres (shops), waste management and recycling, sports centres, public areas (parks and gardens) etc. and would also have easy access to the surrounding country-side.

Urbanates would be designed "katascopicly" (from the top-down) as opposed to "anascopicly" (from the bottom-up). The idea is that an Urbanate would be pre-designed to be optimally efficient in all areas, the building(s) would be as energy efficient as possible, and they would be designed with safety in mind, with every building material being completely fire-proof and resistant to almost all natural disasters. It is envisioned that Urbanates will be "manufactured" rather than constructed in the traditional sense. Standardized, prefabricated components will be produced in automated factories and transported to the desired location to be assembled into whatever design is required (with a minimum of human labour used).

Urbanates are to be designed to give each citizen the highest standard of living possible. Getting around in an Urbanate would be inherently easy and efficient, with every kind of major facility placed within walking distance of a housing complex (or within a reasonable distance that can be covered in elevators or moving walkways, eliminating the need for cars). The technocratic movement wishes Urbanates to be something akin to resorts, with all sorts of leisure facilities included.

Urbanates would be connected via a continent-wide transportation network envisioned by Technocracy, which would involve a high speed rail network linking every Urbanate, the “Continental Hydrology”, and air transport. These systems would also be connected to the technate’s industrial sites (consisting of automated factories) for easy transport of goods to consumers, and to all recreational and vacation areas of the continent.

Technocrats propose that all cities in the technate should be gradually abandoned and "mined" for their resources over the course of a few decades. This would involve recycling resources (steel, concrete, glass, plastics etc.), which would then go into building the Urbanates (and other projects), thus reducing the need to extract and process new materials and lessening environmental damage.

The reason given by the technocratic movement for all this ambitious restructuring of urban life is that modern cities are often extremely poorly planned and built in a haphazard way (anascopicly), leading to major inefficiencies, waste and large numbers of social and environmental problems. Technocrats believe that rather than trying to solve all these problems within the framework of existing cities, it is best to start with a clean slate and construct Urbanates. It has also been proposed that some buildings (or perhaps whole areas of the old cities) that are of historical or cultural importance be kept and preserved as a type of outdoor museums.

The North American technate

The North American technate is a design and plan to transform North America into a technocratic society after the collapse of capitalism (a price system). The plan includes using Canada's rich deposits of minerals and hydro-electric power as a complement to the United States's industrial and agricultural capacity.

Criticisms of the movement

The movement is too obscure to attract much criticism. However, Technocrats themselves would argue that those in power, politicians and heads of corporations, are a form of organized opposition. The movement claims that this opposition has helped spread a negative connotation to the term "technocracy" and the ideas associated with it.

Critics make the following claims regarding technocracy:

There is no possible way to eliminate the scarcity of products in the modern world, especially given the large variety that exists today.
The theory that labor time could be drastically reduced at current productivity levels seems extremely suspect given the low unemployment rate in modern Western societies, especially in light of the history of such societies since the creation of the Technocratic movement in the early 20th century. Technocrats, on the other hand, see these societies as inefficient and wasteful, and argue that the unemployment rate is not an accurate measure of the total amount of people working and the amount of work being performed. In the United States, of those of working age only 65% participate in the economy [1], while European countries have an even smaller proportion. Moreover, many of today's jobs are in service industries such as finance, advertising, and retail; many of these jobs would disappear after the transition from a monetary economy to a technocracy, implying that the "real" unemployment rate (a measure excluding such pecuniary jobs that do not produce tangible goods or provide useful services) is much higher than is indicated in today's economy.
The movement lacks organization and a clear path.
Technology cannot solve all of our problems. Technocrats argue that most of our problems are caused by misuse of technology, and conversely, proper use would eliminate most of them.
Naturally scarce things (e.g. gold, diamonds, the Mona Lisa) are impossible to distribute equally. Technocrats argue that today, nearly everything people consume is made by a machine and in some form mass produced; naturally scarce things are so scarce that they will not have an effect on a technocratic society. The Mona Lisa can stay in a museum.
Many people believe that human beings are materially selfish and would not be willing to work unless that work gave them some direct material benefit; thus, according to this view, the technate would fail to function due to a shortage of labor. On the other hand, Technocrats do not see "laziness" as a problem, since one of the main goals of the technate is to reduce the use of labor time through the efficient use of technology. A technocratic society would seek to eventually eliminate human labor through further automation, robotization, and technology. Also, Technocrats argue that the majority of human beings have an inherent drive to do something useful and meaningful with their lives. Those who do not have this drive are in a minority and the technate will be productive enough to be able to afford to simply ignore them. Furthermore, the educational system of the technate would encourage each individual to find what he or she is good at, and work at something that they enjoy doing.

Books on the Technocratic movement

To date, two serious studies of the early history of the Technocratic movement have been published:

William E. Akin, Technocracy and the American Dream: The Technocrat Movement, 1900-1941 (University of California Press, 1977) ISBN 0520031105

Henry Elsner, The Technocrats, Prophets of Automation (Syracuse University Press, 1967)

Elsner's account is from a sociological perspective and so might provide more social theory than history. Akin's book is much more detailed, though deals mostly with the intellectual history of the movement. Neither book is terribly critical of the movement, though they both agree that the Technocrats' influence on American history has been negligible. The authors argue that Technocracy gained a fair amount of national press attention in the midst of the Great Depression, but their time in the spotlight lasted scarcely a year, from 1932-33.

Technocracy in fiction

Science fiction writer Howard Waldrop's short story "You Could Go Home Again" postulates an alternate history where a technocratic government came to power in the United States, resulting in many historical changes, including World War II never happening. However, Waldrop never intended for the story to be an accurate depiction of Technocracy, instead only borrowing elements from it as a backdrop for his story.

External links

de:Technokratie