"Our problem can then be stated as one of the relation between technology and democracy; how can the power of technical control be brought within the range of the consensus of acting and transacting citizens?"
[ Jurgen Habermas, "Towards A Rational Society", Heinenmann Educational Books, London, 1971, p57 ]
Genuine critical theories of society, being those that provide prescriptive as well as descriptive analysis, are uncommon. More so are social theories that also include a strategic political programme. There are valid reasons for this rarity. Any social-theoretical inquiry quickly comes to the recognition of the vast range of chaotic contingencies - including a double hermeneutic - that can dramatically alter the effect of a prescriptive programme. Engaging in a strategic programme can suggest a political partisanship that, in the minds of some, automatically disqualifies a participant from open inquiry. To avoid such suggestions of partisanship requires that the participant engages in rigorous polemics first and foremost in a cooperative search for a rational consensus. This is certainly different to the combination of direct political involvement and philosophy of Heidegger. This inquiry, despite its polemical content, is based on this motivation. It is orientated towards minimising the negative effects of a transforming social order and imbalances in the development of social structures. Indeed, if sociology is the science of crisis identification and minimisation par excellence, then it is also a responsibility of social theory to provide a macro overview. Even if prophesised crises do not eventuate due to a failing in theory or the introduction of (unforeseen) appeasing circumstances this responsibility still holds.
[ See for example the relationship between intellectual theory and prescriptive education in Roland Barthes., "Writers, Intellectuals, Teachers" in Image, Music, Text, Fontana, 1977, pp190-215, the social position of intellectuals as both inheritor of religious morality and the transformation into secular morality, Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, ed and translated by Q. Hoare and G. Nowell Smith, Lawrence and Wishart, 1971, pp1-15 and Michel Foucault, "The Political Function of the Intellectual", Radical Philosophy No. 17, Summer 1977 and Noam Chomsky's first major essay "The Responsibility of Intellectuals", The New York Review of Books, February 23, 1967 available at: http://www.chomsky.info/articles/19670223.htm For a destructive example of the combination of political involvement and philosophy see: Victor Farias, edited Joseph Margolis and Tom Rockmore, translated by Paul Burrell and Gabriel R. Ricci, Heidegger and Nazism, Temple University Press, 1987 and On Heidegger's Nazism and Philosophy. Tom Rockmore, Berkeley, University of California, Press, 1992 available at: http://ark.cdlib.org/ark:/13030/ft6q2nb3wh/ ]
The specific historical circumstances of contemporary times is one where computer mediated communication and information technologies provide the opportunity for global connectivity through a decentralized network of trust relationships with each access point having equivalent adminstrative rights to send and receive information. Despite the disparities of accessibility this stubborn fact remains objective. It provides the mechanism for individual and content censorship to be avoided, for intellectual property claims to be ignored and devalued, to dramatically reduce information processing costs, and to globally distribute information processing labour and capital. Rather than deal with the new social circumstances that must arise from these technically inevitable processes, vested interests still attempt to censor by legislation (whether motivated by religion or psychology), to weaken the free tranmission of ideas, to administrate and bureaucratise without improvements to productivity, to produce profit, but not wealth. These apparent contradictions exist because of the introduction of a qualitatively new means of information production and reproduction and the failure of modern social systems to address these matters in a adaptive manner.
Part of this is undoubtably due to the fact that the free communication of ideas, and the necessity of the generation of ideas by a egalitarian public sphere, is a concept contradicted by existing political economies. To totalitarian regimes, freedom of thought must be by necessity a challenge the regime - otherwise it wouldn't need to be totalitarian! In sectionalised regimes, private interests procedurally deny responsibility for public goods and externalities, or for production in the social interest, that is, those activities raises wealth for society as a whole, rather than a particular interest, or even more to the point, those actions which protect the natural conditions for the regeneration of biological life. With enhancements in information processing there is undoubtably more room for surveillance in the case of totalitarian regimes (the state or corporation) and also the predictive capacity and efficiency of sectionalised regimes. Actions which are contrary to personal freedom and social democracy therefore remain within the realm of the possible and even of the evolving, albeit increasingly inefficient, expensive and counter-productive.
But it is possible to propose a model of society that is more adaptive to the new conditions, that is more efficient, that has greater equality, that wastes less resources, that empowers the individual over their own destiny, and which can bring all together to discuss matters of the common interest. Thus, in conclusion, discussion moves from a social theory of the Internet to introduce the political economy of isocracy, defined through the synthesis of personal freedom and social democracy and their tensions, that accounts for relative scarcity, individual variation, commodity production, public utilities, globalisation and difference. An isocratic society is one where decentralized autonomy is united in networks of trust relationships. It advocates democratic control of social institutions, yet also enhances economic efficiency and productivity. It advocates universal human rights, including the self-transformation of the members of the species, without recourse to the majority fiat of demagogy. It seeks to incorporate wealth and welfare, economy and the environment, and the very best elements of socialist and capitalist thought. Finally, it recognizes that the future of modernity is not post-modernity, but rather transhumanism.
The true revolutionary contribution of the Internet is not just the exceptional improvements in the distributivity and replication of information or even the merging of existing electronic communication and information devices (telephone, television, radio), but also the collective computational and processing power of parallel and distributed networks. At the time of writing, this particular aspect of the Internet is only just beginning to be tested, albeit with some very high objectives - a cure for cancer and the search for extra-terrestial intelligence. The capacity for for distributed and parralel processing in robotic production, genetic research and administration is only beginning to be fully understood. Such efforts are hampered by institutional systems and procedures that do not yet equate structurally with the new means of production and information. This is, of course, a typical fact of history; vested interests in existing institutional systems resist the tendency for administrative systems to structurally correlate with technological systems which themselves arise from the new means of information and communication which alters the status of knowledge in a society.
[ See the proceedings of The 2003 International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Processing Techniques and Applications (PDPTA'03: June 23-26, 2003, Las Vegas, Nevada, USA), http://www.cs.mu.oz.au/~aharwood/PDPTA/cfp/ http://www.chem.ox.ac.uk/curecancer.html and http://setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/download.html Virtual screening using grid computing: the screensaver project" W. Graham Richards Nature Reviews Drug Discovery 1, 551-555 [2002]. http://www.nature.com/cgi-taf/DynaPage.taf?file=/nrd/journal/v1/n7/index.html E. Keith Davies, Meir Glick, Karl N. Harrison, W. Graham Richards, "Pattern recognition and massively distributed computing", Journal of Computational Chemistry, Volume 23, Issue 16, 2002. Pages: 1544-1550 ]
Before enunciating a preliminary definition of an isocracy it is necessary to examine some failed instances of the term. As Herodutus points out isonomy indicates where there is an equality of political power through the absence of power between participants: "I want neither to rule nor be ruled", a political system initially instituted by Solon and reformulated by Cleisthenes (508-507 B.C.). As Thucydides points out however such "fair sounding names" are oft used to cover up the failures of democracy and aristorcacy. Likewise, in a contemporary context, one may illustrate the failure of applying isocratic methods between institutional bodies, such as the U.S. and Australian senates or even the United Nations General Assembly. Justly described as "unrepresentative swill", such bodies are indicitive of the subservience of an equality of rights between individual to institutional instrests. Less than any confusion arise in the future, let it be unequivocally stated that because individuals are the source of intersubjective relations, political power can only remain in the individual instance. The suggestion that complex societies are not held together through normative structures is, and rather operate through "self-maintaining autopoetic systems" require the surrender of individual rights and moral justifications where "Eichmann's banality" is not only a justification, but a necessity.
[ Herodutus, Book III, p80-82 See Hannah Arendt On Revolution, p30 and 285 Paul Keating coined this term as Prime Minister of Australia. c.f., Jurgen Habermas' comments on Niklass Luhmann, Legitimation Crisis, pp130-142 Hanah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, Viking Press, 1965 [FP 1963] ]
Despite this emphasis on the equal rights of individuals and the limitation of the rule of organizations and institutions over the life and rights of individuals, there is no suggestion here of an individualistic approach, or even a discussion on matters of individual action and reflection, intentionality, psychoanlysis and interpretation. The individual in this particular context is understood as a social reality and a political issue and whilst much of what follows is more considered "political theory" or "economic theory" rather than "social theory" this again is indicitive of a disciplinary functionalism which relegates questions of political value and evaluation, and economic value and evaluation, into a non-controversial manner by which "politics" and "economics" are understood as subsystems of the whole. Once the reason or value of political and economic subsystems however is raised, and posited as a universal question rather than as a means for sectional interests, then inevitably one is confronted by a claim that is both trivial and revolutionary - that the social system should exist for freedom.
"Freedom" is a not a natural condition by any stretch of the imagination and it is trivially true that one person's freedom may - but not necessarily - impinge on the freedom of another. Freedom is therefore something that has to be ensured and guaranteed, artificially as it were, to also ensure the equal moral rights of all participants in free action. Thus the foundation of the freedom, at least in the political sense, is to be found in the notion of the constitution. For it is in constitutions that the governing social body both establishes itself, sets into motion its purposes and actions and the limitations of its actions and protects itself from the vagaries of temporal moods. It is in a constitution that one finds the clearest legal protection - and likewise the possibility of none at all - whereby the private realm is protected from the misuse of public power. It is also in the constitution one finds - or does not find - the embodiment of the principle of the separation of powers, which recognizes both the will of the people (democracy, legislative), the capacity of application (enforcement, executive) and expertise in judgement (meritocracy, judiciary). It is in fact an indication of the moral responsibility of a government - whereby it deliberately limits its own sovereignity - to prove that it is most just.
[ I raise the suggestion of a "moral constitution" in order to resolve the paradox identified by Hart, H.L.A., (1994) The Concept of Law, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press) and John Austin, (1995) The Province of Jurisprudence Determined (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) (Hart 1994, 73-78; Austin 1995, Lecture VI) whereby the idea of the state or legal system limiting itself as being contradictory. For separation of powers see: Montesquieu, Baron de, (1949) The Spirit of the Laws, tr. Thomas Nugent, ed., F. Neumann (New York) EDIT ]In those political theories which are dedicated to human freedom, including anarchism, liberalism, libertarianism (whether of the capitalist or socialist variety), the political and legal entrenchments are well understood and have, in modern times, been carefully developed and indeed evolved through the Bill of Rights in the United States and the French Rights of Man and Citizens and more recently the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations. In terms of social and political theory, the notion of "rights" has a politically ontological basis. In its most advanced expression it posits that all mature and reasoning beings have the right to engage in whatever self-regarding acts they desire, and other-regarding acts with the consent of an equal participants. Even actions which may demonstrably harm an individual or consensual participants is not sufficient grounds for intervention against free action of individuals, as John Stuart Mill's oft-quoted passage notes:
"His own good, either physical or moral is not a sufficient warrant.� He cannot rightfully be compelled to do or forbear because it will be better for him to do so, because it will make him happier, because in the opinion of others, to do so would be wise or even right.� There are good reasons for remonstrating with him, or reasoning with him, or persuading him, or entreating him, but not for compelling him, or visiting him with any evil in case he do otherwise.� To justify that, the conduct from which it is desired to deter him, must be calculated to produce evil to someone else" .
Indeed a society which does so cannot be described as being a free society:
"No society in which these liberties are not, on the whole, respected, is free, whatever may be its form of government; and none is completely free in which they do not exist absolute and unqualified.� The only freedom which deserves the name is that of pursuing our own good in our own way, as long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs, or impede their efforts to obtain it.� Each is the proper guardian of his own health, whether bodily, or mental and spiritual."
[ United States Bill of Rights: http://www.archives.gov/national_archives_experience/bill_of_rights.html also at: http://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/constitution.billofrights.html D�claration des droits de l'Homme et du citoyen, 26 ao�t 1789 http://www.justice.gouv.fr/textfond/ddhc.htm Universal Declaration of Human Rights: http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html Susan Waltz, On the Universality of Human Rights, The Journal of the International Institute, Vol 6, No 3, University of Michegan, Summer 1999 http://www.umich.edu/~iinet/journal/vol6no3/waltz.htm John Stuart Mill, On Liberty EDIT and ibid EDIT. ]
To have the ontological equality of self-regarding and consensual other-regarding acts embodied in a constitution - the operating system of government, to use the computing metaphor - is a necessary condition for isocracy. Likewise however, so is the requirement for a republican constitution. There is no need here to fully elaborate on the political distinction between republican, monarchial and aristorcatic systems of government. It is self-evident that a system that demands an equality of power between all, is antithetical to the demands that one is "in potestate domini" (in the power of a master). But the absence of a monarchy or aristocracy does not indicate a republic - regardless of what some political systems may claim (e.g., the People's Democratic Republc of Korea). For a republic must limit its governing authority to "res publica" (the public thing), yet also expresses total authority over this limited domain of life - all social institutions and all social property - is under the jurisdiction and authority of the total population under peaceful juridiction, antithetical to despots of the few or the many. From this direction that one understands the necessity of an explicit tie between republicanism, constitutionalism and governing systems which give guarentees to the individual and collective rights and freedoms necessary for isocracy.
[ Res Publica Condition and Epistemic Community: Research Notes Under Tulip Trees, Junning Yiu, Workshop in Political Theory and Policy Analysis, Indiana University, 2004 http://www.indiana.edu/~workshop/papers/y673_spring_2001_liu.pdf ]
The "public thing" also implies an open public realm for discussion, debate and deliberation where all may participate providing the foundation of a geniune community. It is thus necessary to suppose the requirement of "participatory democracy" in an institutional and formal sense as the foundation - the operating system kernel, to continue with the metaphor. To do this the latter demands of Thomas Jefferson are worthy of reference and implementation - "divide the counties into wards", "divide every county into hundreds", "the vital principle ... for the perfect exercise of self-government and for its preservation". No doubt the loss of legitimation in contemporary society is at least in part due to the isolation of individuals from decision making structures and their inability to participate, likewise the concentration of power, the influence of vested interets and in particular the rise of sectional organizational power over universalistic concerns. In order for a social system to be described as an isocracy, it is requisite that all participants have direct access to "discuss, debate and deliberate" in decision making bodies of public concern.
[ Thomas Jefferson to Joseph C. Cabell 2 Feb. 1816 in The Founders' Constitution, Volume 1, Chapter 4, Document 34 (ed Phillip B. Kurland, Ralph Lerner), 1987 http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/v1ch4s34.html The University of Chicago Press Thomas Jefferson to John Tyler, 1810. Notably it follows "of such size that all the children of each will be within reach of a central school in it." Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:38 For participatory democracy in communications technology see: Rating the Impact of New Technologies on Democracy, http://frontpage.auburn.edu/tann/tann2/rating.htm ]
It is a matter of historical fact that in every modern instance where people have acted with their own violition to form a government such natural republics have arisen, whether called societies, councils, communes, soviets, ratesrepublik. Their strength has been their revolutionary elan, the active participation of free individuals who force into existence "something out of nothing", a new public sphere, and invariably much to the surprise of "professional" revolutionary associations and as much a surprise to the targets of the revolutionary fevour. Their great weakness however, is invariably their fragmentation and their lack of connection with similar organizations, either resulting in a hijacking of the revolutionary spontaneity or the restoration of deposed powers - in either case, a defeat. The only mechanism by which such organizations can survive, again recognized by Jefferson, is by the principle of confederation - the establishment of a network protocol without a central authority - whereby each "organic republic" elects representatives to the next level, presumably again of equivalent size, and so on, thus nullifying John Seldon's (1584-1645) excuse for a representative parliamentary system on the grounds that "the room will not hold all".
[ Hannah Arendt, On Revolution, pp257-265 See Rosa Luxemberg on spontaneity of revolutionary masses in The Mass Strike, The Political Party and the Trade Unions, edit. Quoted in Hanah Arendt, p236 ]
Genuine concerns have been raised however of the result of federations, especially the tendency for the centralization of power in the federal authority, and likewise, of the intransigence of regional authorities to apply universal moral principles (e.g., the "slave states" of the United States and application of racial discrimination). Part of this is of course due to the fact that the "elementary republics" are never formally established, and the federation is rarely a development of the collective agreement of participating bodies, but rather it is imposed from above and thus sectional interests have, once again, a distorting influence. In other words, rather than a confederation where bodies cede authority to a higher body, they are federations where the higher body grants the authority to the lower body. Nowhere in any constitution - not even that of the former Soviet Union - does one find the genuine recognition and authority of "elementary republics". Contrary to the claims of Hannah Arendt, Thomas Jefferson did apply suggest two very important and integral roles to the function of such republics (a) as a means of communication to higher authorities and (b) as the locus for the establishment of militia. As a general principle, the higher the authority the more universal their application of their jurisdiction (e.g., environment, foreign relations, common and criminal law) whereas the closer to a "elementary republic" the more specific their application (e.g., civil administration and civil law).
[ Hannah Arendt, On Revolution, pp254-255 "These wards once established, will be found convenient and salutary aids in the administration of government, of which they will constitute the organic elements, and the first integral members in the composition of the military." --Thomas Jefferson: Note to Elementary School Act, 1817. ME 17:419 ]
These matters expressed, it is necessary to move from political theory to economic theory. Espousing principles of isocracy in terms of a decentralized network of trust relationships with individual freedoms available to all is one matter on which the libertarian capitalist and socialist alike can agree. Property rights and distributive justice however is an entirely different matter. From one perspective, that from classical liberalism to contemporary libertarian capitalism, the individual has the right to engage in labour, exchange and contract as they see fit. On the other side, from socialist, anarchist and communist critics, these principles are a historical fallacy when compared to the division of the commons, the poor laws, the colonization of the Africa, Asia and the Americas, the institution of negro slavery and up to and including the derivation of profit from the labour of others through the ownership of capital. Little wonder some claim the need to "expropriate the expropriators". On a less extreme and more contemporary basis, there are capitalist claims that taxation and welfare are examples of "socialist theft" by collectivist governments, whereas the socialist claims that profits and business subsidies are "capitalist theft" by privateering corporations.
There is no way around concepts of a just distribution of wealth, or redistribution, other than to develop a theory of just property relations. The general principle arising from John Locke's concept of "mixing labour with nature", in which both socialist and capitalist alike seem to fortunately agree, is that every indivdiual is entitled to the full result of their labour. What this model does not recognize however is that the only just right in the product is the labour itself - the exchange value of the natural resource component itself (to use the old language, 'a gift of Providence') is something that is, as Henry George, in effect taken from the commonwealth and expropriated to private hands. All economic rent collected from unimproved land-site values, the broadcast spectrum, metal and mineral extraction, and other returns from natural resources is community property. Such community rent does not distort market mechanisms, is simple and cost-efficient to administer and where implemented correlates with an improved condition. Furthermore, it ensures a greater emphasis on labour and capital added use of resources and minimises environmental externalities. It is therefore requisite for an isocracy, through the collection of economic rent from use of natural resources, to provide for the welfare ("distributive justice") and public service to all.
[ See John Rawls, A Theory of Justice, pp258-332 for an tragic example of an attempt to incorporate 'distributive justice' without a grounding in property relations. John Locke, Second Treatise of Government, FP 1689 Every man has a property in his own person... The labour of his body and the work of his hands, we may say, are properly his. Whatsoever, then, he removes out of the state that Nature hath provided and left it in, he hath mixed his labour with it, and joined to it something that is his own, and thereby makes it his property. Henry George, Progress and Poverty. 1879. See also: Henry George: precursor to public choice analysis - economist American Journal of Economics and Sociology, The, �April, 1998 �by Thomas E. Borcherding, �Patricia Dillon, �Thomas D. Willett and Horton, Joseph, and Thomas Chisholm. "The Political Economy of Henry George: Its Ethical and Social Foundations." American Journal of Economics and Sociology 50 (July 1991): 375-384. ]
The collection of economic rent for community benefit would undoubtably provide welfare services for all far more efficiently that other existing taxation regimes, especially the bland presumption and mathematical illiteracy from many ultraleft propagandists that "faire payer les riches" is a viable means to generate social welfare. What it doesn't illustrate of course is the necessity for directed planning and regulation of centralized infrastructure industries (the environment, natural resources, energy utilities, telecommunications, public transport, welfare), indicitive planning and regulation for decentralised infrastructure industries (credit unions, health, education, housing, parklands) and deregulation and distributed planning for private enterprise production of consumer goods and the arts and entertainment products and services. In all these cases however, administrative and economic science must be applied regardless - the price and market mechanism for relative scarcity and demand, the organization of labour into specialist tasks and so forth. As Arendt pointed out, the difference between economics and politics is that the former is born of necessity and the latter of freedom.
[ See for example: Faire payer les riches: 500 milliards, Solidaire No. 15/1998 - 8 avril 1998, Hebdomadaire du Parti du Travail de Belgique (PTB) http://www.ptb.be/solidaire/f1598/payer.htm ]
Perhaps the most difficult pill for both socialist and capitalist proponents to accept is the possibility that in some organizations they may actually have to meet in the middle - that is, the introduction of workplace democracy on a managerial level, such as the European work councils, or even more appropriately, the establishment of workers' cooperatives which also seek venture capitalisation without directives - the profit derived is its own reward. Whilst full elaboration of these matters are neither requisite for this preliminary definition, further exploration is considered important to provide a means for effective co-operation between all interests involved in an enterprise to enhance the productivity and wealth of all interests, as a means to avoid psychological alientation from work processes, and to make the most effective and efficient use of human resources in an enterprise. There is also the interest in promoting dynamic and transparent management within organizations as when an organization increase in size and stability there is a ovewhelming tendency not to engage in efficient activity, but obsfucation for the purposes of strengthening management positions.
[ Robert L. Pritchard, Industrial Democracy in Australia, Commerce Clearing House Australia, 1977 [FP 1976] For an amusing and very dry exposition of this behaviour in a contemporary setting see Scott Adams, The Dilbert Principle, Harper Collins, 1996 ]Finally, the proposition raised in this inquiry as a result of contemporary economic and management studies and educational theory - the need for the establishment of an corporate educational subsystem with the same sort of institutional autonomy currently enjoyed by commercial organizations, to be funded through commercial corporations and whose research and development is entirely independent, but also entirely available to the public. The basis of future wealth in an isocratic system will be generation of publically accessible knowledge by the educational subsystem and its economic application by the commercial subsystem. Commercial corporations themselves cannot make effective resource allocation decisions to individuals on what is effectively an increasingly mobile public good. Placing educational objectives under the constraints of political-state administration (with the exception of the "welfare" component, i.e., childhood education), places the independence of research and funding under unnecessary risks. Turning educational institutions in commercial organizations truncuates knowledge and provides a general fetter on economic development that is less than the gains derived by particular interests. Only institutional and systematic autonomy for the educational subsystem with its commitment to produce open source knowledge provides a new rational foundation for free, public and secular education.
The prospect of a confederate network of isocratic republics is raised as the best possible political and economic system to ensure the freedom and rights of individuals, to ensure environmental protection, to promote wealth and commerce, to provide welfare and democracy, to encourage research and development and open source access to educated and considered information. The development of a confederate network of isocratic republics is the most effective politican and economic system that correlates with the typology introduced by the Internet and is most adaptable to the prospect of the self-transformation and elaboration of the human species. These are no doubt, to use the phrase of Karl Popper, "bold conjectures", and testing their theoretical veracity in detail is outside the rather scope of this inquiry. But by the same token, raising the prospect of introducing such a political and economic system as a practical task also requires at least initial analysis, for good ideas in virtue of the truth-bearing capacity alone is insufficient to generate systematic change. Politics, even when inspired by public interest and universal morality, remains the art of the possible.
The possibility of achieving social change of this nature can analyzed along three dimensions to identify levels of support and opposition. First and foremost is the possibility of alignment according to value convictions. In this instance the degree of political support varies by the rational consideration by individuals in making comparison with alternative propositions. Secondly, alignment can also be analyzed according occupational class and - where it still exists - political rank. Finally, institutional loyalties (such as religion, nationality or employment) provides a further distortion. Whilst the latter two dimensions of analysis constitute ideological support, that is justifications which result from the distortion of communicative rational justifications on the basis of an unconscious instrumental rationality. Whilst it is obvious preferable to succeed in social change because of the rational convictions, to ignore class and institutional interests constitutes a moral and rational utopianism which does not exist in the real world.
On the basis of rational convictions, the strongest level of support is likely to come from libertarian socialists and libertarian capitalists of the non-dogmatic variety (i.e., those of whom their "libertarianism" is stronger than their commitment to an absolute model of economic organization). Environmentalists who have a systematic orientation towards solving the problems arising from modernist growth imperatives should also see the virtue especially in the "community rent" propositions. Some liberals and reformists could also be supportive, especially those who are committed to the systematic development of modernity. Perhaps surprisingly, some conservative are also likely to be supportive on the same basis - that there personal conservatism also constitutes includes commitment to modernist democracy in the public domain. On the negative side, various forms of absolutists (religious or political) and authoritarian orientations - those who hold that particular societies in a concrete sense are definable according to a religious or political belief system - are most certainly going to be oppositional. Likewise, some radicals of the antimodernist variety, including those with a "retreatist" approach to the social system and some environmentalists, who would disapprove of the emphasis on accelerating modernity to a global transhuman future, could be oppositional. Finally, some liberals and reformists, especially those with a strong commitment to gradualism and incremental change may disapprove of the fundamental changes suggested.
Analysis on probable supoprt on the basis of political rank or economic class in no way denigrates the libertarian commitment and preference to convictions based on reasons. Indeed, it is the existence of such hierarchial means of systematic differentiation that introduces the prospect in the first place. All that this analysis does is admit that some classes would benefit from the introduction of an isocratic system whereas some would not, or would be required to redirect their resources. With positive orientation there can be no doubt the vast numbers of peasants in the developing world would surely benefit from a system that curtails land speculation - but of course the probability of exposure of their to these ideas are at least initially quite slim. Likewise those engaged in unksilled or skilled manual labour, especially those engaged in construction and electrical trades etc., would receive benefits as resources are redirected from speculative to productive labour. White collar workers, especially those with a highly technical and scientific orientation, have always been strong movements of libertarian movements in the public benefit, standing in stark contrast to the expectations of Marxist analysis. Of course, both workers and capitalist alike would approve of the reduction of taxes. Some forms of employment and industry would of course, receive a negative reaction. Land speculators and their allies in real estate agencies and admnistration would find a reallocation of their investments beneficial and the generous subsidies enjoyed by mining companies and through pastoral leases etc would be reduced or eliminated. Those whose income is primarily derived through the restrictive application of copyright and patents or who privately benefit through publically-funded research and development would undoubtably be oppositional.
If the quantity of opposition from convictional and even class grounds is relatively low and not sustainable, then opposition from vested organizational interests. Indeed, it is difficult to imagine many organizations who would support the idea of wide-spread political decentralization, open source knowledge and so forth with possibly only some advanced research bodies who already exist with a decentralized network of collegial scholarship. Certainly establishment political organizations across the world who have benefit by the "party system" of all ideological hues would find the recommended political system highly troubling as heavy reliance is placed on individual participation and recognition of representatives. As Hannah Arendt has suggested, the establishment of the council system, no matter what its incarnation, represents both a surprise to both revolutionary organizations and their targets, but also it creates the conditions where they are no longer needed. The purpose of a revolutionary party therefore is not to seize power, for that is the anti-revolutionary act it can do, constituting nothing less than a coup from the people. A revolutionary organization exists to educate the population that they can and how they can seize power. Once this is achieved they can, like Pitt the Younger's parliament, abolish themselves, knowing that their work is done.
[ Or even more appropriately, the military junta of Costa Rica of 1948, after ensuring free elections and giving women and "blacks" the vote, abolished not only it's status as governing authority, but also the institution of a standing armed force. ]Different societies have different capacity for self-transformation and as such different political strategies are most probable. In general, the capacity of change in a sociological sense is dependent on the existing technological and systematic order of the society (in this case, degree of computational, information and communications technology, degree of institutional complexity and decentralization) and the existing political-economy system (in this case the degree of environmental responsibilities, civic rights, social welfare, free enterprise, social democracy etc). In comparison, the probability of change in a cultural anthropological sense is the historical tendency of a community's capacity to adopt change. The difference between the technological and systematic order and the political economy - the means of production and communication and the relations of production and communication - as modified by the cultural and historical circumstances (although these are often over-rated) is indicitive of the the likelihood of reactionary, conservative, reformist or revolutionary political change.
Reactionary social and political change is likely only in two scenarios. The first is when natural or human disaster destroys so much of the existing technological and institutional infrastructure that the reversion that a previously discarded political-economy is requisite to maintain some degree of social intergity. A more tragic case however is when a group of well-meaning, albeit misguided group of idealistic revolutionaries seize power in a temporary manifestation of incompetence on the part of a ruling regime. Invariably such revolutionaries attempt to introduce a political and economic system that cannot possibly correlate to the technological and systematic complexity required. Such attempts invariably fail unless there is a massive instrusive input from outside sources. A more probably result is either the restoration of the prior regime and often in a more brutal form. To put in a particular context, an isocratic system of government cannot be introduced into nation-states unless there is a pre-existing advanced degree of computational and communications infrastructure and both complexity and decentralization in the social system - which, it may be added, was at least close to existing in the cases of the revolutionary colonies of the United States.
Conservative approaches to social transformation are usually considered as an impediment to social transformation. To be sure this is the case once a revolution fails to both establish itself and reactionary forces are likewise curtailed - the typical result is that the state loses its revolutionary vigour and adopts a policy of centralized stability and expansion. This is certainly the case with the contemporary United States and the former Soviet Union. However, conservatism does not necessarily imply this, especially when a political-economy is capable of self-transformation and is making substantial gains towards a desired state. Indeed, to threaten revolution to such systems is to beckon the possibility of losing previously established gains. Whilst there is a strong correlation between the degree of technologically-mediated infrastructure and decentralization of institutional adminstration then it is also likely that the government, being balanced, will also have provide high levels of environmental responsibility, personal freedom, social democracy etc. Most of the nations of continental Europe fall into this category regarding the prospect of establishing a network of isocratic republics.
Likewise reformist approaches are often considered, at least from the perspective of an involving modernity, in a positive light. But with regard to a enunciated and particular goal state this is not axiomatically a positive feature. True, a reformist goverment can certainly be one that is keeping up with times, that is ensureing that the organizational typology of social institutions is maintaining some semblence of correlation with advances in technological and systematic complexity, but the requirement of a reformist approach is something different. When reformist becomes required, that is indicitive that there is a substantial gap between the development of technological and systematic complexity however the the political economy has not kept pace - probably due to the failure of past regimes whose approach was too conservative. With regards to the degree of development of computational and communications technology and systems and comparison with the proposed analagous political economy of isocracy, the United States is the most important example of a regime which excels in the first category by is a long way behind in the latter, thus strongly testing the capacity of its government's capacity for self-transformation. Ironically, Viet Nam and Cuba are be two other globally renowned nations whose decentralized political system and often adaptable economic solutions may be able to correlate well to the new technologies with as long as there are equivalent improvements in social democracy and personal freedoms.
Finally, there are those political economies whose ideological commitments stand in stark contrast to the new technologies and the possibility of decentralized complex systems. Where there is a substantial gap between the two within the same society is a recipe for revolution. This is not something for glorification, although both Rousseau and Engels understood and commented on the role of violence in history. Whilst Mao suggested, that political power is derived from violence, that it "grows from the barrel of a gun", power achieved this way is power without legitimacy, power that neither has the hearts nor the minds of the people to whom the gun is pointed at. It is an act of desparation, and often of necessity, when political and economic rulers are so intransigent and oblivious to maintaining their privileges that they must be forced from office. We are reminded of Peguy's demand that "the social revolution will be moral or it will not be". It is the dearest wish of all revolutionaires that fundamental social change occurs with the collapse of an intransigent elite, rather than a protracted period of violence.
It is then with grave difficulty that consideration is given to existing regimes which mainatin a political and economic model of elitism, centralism, disregard for individual rights and a refusual to implement organizational democracy whilst at the same time attempt to introduce all the benefits of the new computational and communicative technologies and establish complex social systems. In the long run, the two cannot co-exist, just as religious states could not maintain their absolute authority once a means of massive (and secret) reproduction of alternative texts existed. Unless such regimes take immediate steps in self-transformation - and there is no indication that they will do so as they exist as their leaders in a fantasy of their own security - they run the very real risk of social revolution. Two significant states which face this possibility include the People's Republic of China and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Either these regimes must change their political economies, or destroy the new technologies and remain trapped in time. There is no third way - to be blunt, they must evolve or die.
A Social Theory of the Internet provided a technological overview and history of a particular instance of computational and communications technology. As the inquiry developed, the notion that such technologies themselves are a necessary and usually overlooked component of social development became evident, first through the review of technology in a general sense, and then in the literature related to the Internet. Particular critical issues for the Internet were raised which require legal, political and economic changes in order for the technology to fulfill its emancipatory potential. When placed in the context of other probable developments over the next one hundred years, then the necessity of developing a political and economic system that is analogous to the technical and organizational system becomes evident. The technological imperative suggests that our most advanced societies are organized among decentralized networks of trust relationships with individual autonomy and social democracy. The prospect remains in front of us - all of us - to convert our communication communities [Kommunikationsgemeinschaft] a communication society [Kommunikationsgeselschaft] - for the purpose of freedom.
Last update May 9, 2004