Post-Scarcity Is Not Science Fiction, It's Liberation :: Why we don't need ubertech to achieve this goal
My readership deserves a more optimistic perspective, and I believe that Leftism is based on optimism, not cynicism. Cynicism is what turns old radicals into liberals, and liberals into moderates, and conservatives. It’s what turns conservatives into the Far Right. That’s not for me. I have hope, not for parties or our current political system, or our current socioeconomic order, but for people.
So, I am going to attempt outline my mind-bogglingly
simple theory about how a post-scarcity future is not science fiction.
Ready for this?
We could have a post-scarcity, post-disparity economy now,
if we got rid of capitalism and put technology to work for the working class.
How, you ask me?
Since the 1960s, we have had the technological capability
to build a slower-than-light but long-ranged interstellar starship that could
reach another solar system within my lifetime. It could be powered by any number
of nuclear drives, likely a variant of the Orion Drive (nuclear pulse drive) or
another existing model of interstellar propulsion, like an Enzmann Starship or a Medusa Drive (fission sail).
The technology exists, but it is monopolized by governments and private
industry. And that is why it has never been done, not because we can’t, but
because our leaders are unwilling to take a risk that would threaten their own
power.
Any civilization capable of this feat- and we are such
a civilization- would also be able to eliminate most scarcity and establish a totally classless, much more egalitarian society. It would not be utopia because new social problems would
arise, but a classless society, in my mind, could better navigate the nuances
of those problems. For example, automation or artificial intelligence would not be a threat to a work-voluntary society, and people who find meaning in work could still labor out of passion or love. We don’t
need AI or even such a starship to do this, merely having the capability to do build such a starship is enough. It would be more than enough energy to feed, clothe and shelter the
entire planet's poulation, and it would be concurrent with full wealth redistribution. Money
would go the way of the dinosaurs, and the future would be bright. Not perfect,
but better.
The theme of my novel, “Rentkids,” which I am
attempting to publish, is that “better than nothing” is never “enough.” Some
people call this idealistic. I think it’s realistic, and pragmatic, from an
anarchist perspective. Anarchy is not chaos. Anarchy is the democratization of
daily life, work and family. The Starfarers in my stories and novels, such as “Rentkids,”
are a nomadic group of spacefaring revolutionaries. Their society is not
perfect- they have their biases, such as when confronted with the hyper
capitalist world of Tantalus II where the main characters hail from. But their
society is egalitarian enough that their humanity can wither away those biases.
I don’t believe society will ever be perfect. All societies are complex and
nuanced. But I think we can navigate nuance and complexity better and with justice if we liberate
technology from the elites. I don’t believe in a technocratic meritocracy. I
don’t like the fetishization of intelligence or its conflation with morality,
ethics or values. But I am not an anti-intellectual, and I am anti-elitist. I
believe anarchism resolves these conflicts. It resolves church and state. It
resolves science and religion. Anarchism is the liberation of people from division
and conquest by the ruling class. To do this, we must liberate ourselves from
bourgeois values. We, the People, must aim to rise not from our class, but with
our class, in the words of Eugene Debs, labor organizer and one of the founders
of the IWW.
I believe in Eugene Debs’ credo, quoted from his statement upon conviction under the Espionage Act in 1918, for which he was persecuted for opposing conscription in a war fought mostly by monarchs and the political class of liberal democracies:
"Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living beings, and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest on Earth. I said them, and I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it, and while there is a criminal element I am of it, and while there is a soul in prison, I am not free."
I believe in the spirit of that statement. I believe it encapsulates solidarity. I believe it is a blueprint for a better future.
It’s not science fiction. It’s liberation.
Comments
Furthermore, I believe in a meritocracy. Even Marxism is about meritocracy (those who put most of the work--the working class-- should enjoy more the fruits of their labor).
I do like your idealism and enthusiasm. I don't share your animosity against Church and State. Although their influence is diminishing, they both serve a purpose.
Still, what a thought-provoking article!
I am curious what specific technology do you believe must exist in order to achieve classlessness that is not related to energy production? I can't imagine anyone seriously believes something like "matter replicators" from Star Trek will ever exist. Thermodynamics does not work that way and "you canna change the laws of physics," as Scotty would say.
Usually when people say "church and state both serve a purpose" the purpose is enforcing a hierarchical social order. For example I hear this across the political spectrum, from everyone from religious traditionalists to atheists who favor a variant of western supremacy in the guise of a very biased secularism (not the kind of secularism I support, which is pluralist and inclusive). I don't think France, for example, does secularism well. Laicite (can't spell that for shit) basically privileges traditional Roman Catholicism and is quite anti-Islamic and Nationalistic, even moreso than France's often-mentioned anti-semitism. It's very much about reinforcing and bolstering a racist and classist social order with white Europeans on top, Jews somewhere in the middle, and (usually brown) Muslims at the bottom. Western Europe is not the utopia liberals imagine it because global capitalism is a thing, it's not the US Republican Party that's responsible for all of this. They're just one wing of Global Capitalism.
Marxism is only meritocratic in the sense that every social system "wants" to be meritocratic in theory, and Marxists believe merit is assumed rather than "earned" through competition or wage labor. So it's not wrong to call it anti-meritocratic, but that's really a matter of semantics. Technocracy is usually associated with control by specialized expertsm, and while any complex social organization requires specialist and non-specialist labor, Marxists and anarchists see no reason why a social hierarchy between different sets of laborers should exist. We don't believe other socioeconomic classes should exist either so it's not a matter of "the people doing the most work" getting "what they deserve." That's actually a reactionary understanding of Marxism, that is unfortunately very commonplace. If we eliminate class stratification there's no competition, only labor and an efficient allocation of resources. THere would be obviously some role for specialists/experts, but as a specialist/expert myself, I'm very skeptical that anyone is above bias and I think the answer to that problem of institutional bias is more egalitarian institutions.
I used to be a self-identified "Technocrat" but I found that this philosophy was incompatible with social justice and my concerns had always come from a place of compassion and a frustration with a society that I came to see as "permitting" poverty to exist because of the biases and notions of the middle class and our political leadership.
But yeah... I maintain that any civilization capable of building such a vehicle- and we are one- could theoretically have justice, but the people in charge are holding that progress back because it would mean they have to give up power and their egos can't take it. I actually think most politics outside of Leftism are rather more psychological than materialist. It's all about ego-defense and loyalty to political tribes. I'm sick of egos and tribalism. I've no desire to live under tribalism than feudalism or capitalism. And I also was an anarcho-primitivist for a long time as a youth, so it's not like these aren't things I haven't considered. I actually think I was much more idealistic (and confused) back then about my values than I am not as someone with the benefit of more age and experience. I find liberalism idealistic and naive, and I'm very alienated by neoliberalism because neoliberalism isn't alienated enough for me to trust it. I actually think it's easier to persuade conservatives to move left than moderates and liberals who are less insecure about their politics and their place in the party and don't come across to me as sticks-in-the-mud. But I've also met a lot of well meaning people who are very smart but not connected with a broader leftist community engaging in an ongoing dialog, and so they haven't had sufficient cause or prompting to examine their own biases. I think the way Americans talk about politics is provincial. It's like that "What do you a quarter pounder in France" conversation from "Pulp Fiction."
The conservatives I am talking about do not include the CHristian Right. Those people are lost and I don't know how to speak with them because they are so prone to conspiracy theories and they think everything is a battle between good and evil (and I am Satan) that it's like we're having entirely separate conversations. But I've met a lot of smart conservatives who probably wouldn't be conservatives if they weren't so afraid and isolated. It's easier for me to empathize with that than with liberals.
So yeah. I used to consider myself as believing in meritocracy but I left that behind when I left those insufferable "New Atheists" back in my college days. There's a lot I've considered and grown out of because I was willing to listen to other people who helped me reconcile these things. I've not always felt this way, though I've pretty much always considered myself an anti-capitalist. I think you might have misunderstood my views on church and state. I am for government (services like education, transportation, public parks, etc). Anarchists are for those things. But we make a distinction between that the State, defined as the militarized protection of private property (above even human life). The State imposes conflict between believers and nonbelievers because capitalism requires that religion, like race, gender, sexual orientation, etc, be used to divide and conquer the working class. I'm an atheist but I'm not anti-religious. I just think as long as we have the State, the Religious Right will fight things like public schools and access to healthcare and evidence-based sex ed. Capitalism imposes that conflict. This article wasn't an explication of all of that, only about a feasible starship whose energies could provide the vehicle for full wealth redistribution without ever leaving Earth!
This is why I actually LOVE nuclear power. Hot take. I just think we should build power plants in space and beam the energy to Earth so it's a bit safer. That way if there's a meltdown we don't have Chernobyl.
But there is a difference between futurology and science fiction, like there is a differene between government and the State. But that's another post!