Overview
The article looks at technocracy in comparison with communism. The article results from a discussion at I had the Thermodynamics 2.0Conference. First, I will give a bit of background then I will briefly look at the centralised planned economy of the Soviet Union. They I will give a very short overview of the decentralised, demand drive, moneyless system proposed by EOS. Finally I will give a quick comparison between the two, highlighting a few differences.
Introduction
I was invited to present a paper and to take part of a panel at the Thermodynamics 2.0 Conference. The conference was a place for both natural scientists and social scientists that looks at the emergence of cooperation. What is life as well as money and poverty. My paper was about a moneyless sustainable socioeconomic system and my presentation went well but it was the panel discussion that was the most interesting. During the discussion there was a lively debate comparing the ideas presented in my paper and at the panel with communism. The thing with presenting a paper and giving a presentation at a panel is you don’t really have that much time to fully explain all the ideas. It’s a big complex subject after all. I was only really able to give an overview of technocracy, as advocated by EOS, and couldn’t really go into all the details in the time we had. So, I though I would write up a bit about Technocracy and Communism and go through how they differ or are similar.
Communism
Communism is a bit of a complex ideology so I am going to focus on one aspect of communism that was of reliance for the discussion at the Thermodynamics 2.0 Conference; the centralised planned economy of the Soviet Union.
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| The former HQ of Gosplan (Jorge Lascar) |
The Soviet economy was a centralised planned economy. The state owned all the means of production, from the farms to the factories. The economic production and the distribution of goods was all controlled centrally by the State Planning Commission (Gosplan) and the State Commission for Material and Equipment Supply (Gossnab) together with the central State Bank (Gosbank). Planning was done in a series of five year plans from 1928 onwards. Data was fed to Gosplan from other administrative organisations around the country. Various government officials, committees, departments, and councils within Gosplan would then plan out what to do over the next five years. The plans consisted of plans within plans as various organisations such as government ministries drafted their own plans to met the demands of the plans from Gosplan. Gosplan would monitor the economic situation and plans could be modified as situation dictated.
The form of centralised planning of the Soviet Union eventually failed. Corruption within the system led to faulty decisions being made. Political dogma hindered any adaptions. But in the end, the overall complexity of managing a distributed non-linear, dynamic system was evidently too difficult and the system collapsed with the end of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Technocracy
Technocracy is a system of government where knowledgeable experts make the decisions. Within that vague definition there can be many forms of implementation. The system presented by EOS sees society as complex and makes the distinction between a “people side” and a “technology side”. The people side is run democratically and is community based. The technology side is managed by technical experts and includes the means of production such as farms and factories but also services such as medical care. The system proposed by EOS is also moneyless. Instead of money, EOS proposes a system of energy accounting, where the production capacity is measured in energy, or to be more exact “exergy”, and the energy is then distributed to managed production and individual demands. People then allocate energy to produce the items they want.
Technocracy vs Communism; A comparison
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| A fractal |
There are a number of differences between the two ideologies. The first one is that the system of technocracy proposed by EOS is decentralised rather than a centralised system as used in the Soviet Union. EOS proposes an holonic system where each holon is a part-whole entity (it is both an independent entity in its own right and part of something else), like a fractal shown above. The system starts with individuals who then make up teams and communities. The teams and communities then work on projects at a local level. These teams and communities can then cooperate together to form high level holons that then work on larger scale projects. The holons work towards the own goals as they see fit but these goals are compatible with an overall goal of maintaining the highest standard of living for the longest time possible. It is this goal orientated aspect that enables the system to work as a whole. Such distributed systems tend to be robust when dealing with complex, dynamic, non-linear systems. So, no centralised Gosplan in the system proposed by EOS.
Teams are composed of experts in the plan proposed by EOS. Experts manage the systems and projects under their control. So, local teams would manage project dealing with the production of food for the community, or maintaining the buildings, or running a factory, for example. Higher level teams in higher level holons would then work on projects at their level, such as maintaining transport links between communities or producing a food item that requires a larger distribution.
Another difference is the moneyless nature of the system proposed by EOS. The communist system of the Soviet Union was still a money based system. EOS uses exergy as a representation of the production capacity of the system. People then place demands on the system to produce the items that the people want. So, the system proposed by EOS is a demand driven system where items are produced to met demand. That doesn’t mean that plans can’t be made. Some demands are predictable like the demand for strawberries and cream at Midsummer in Sweden or the demands for fireworks around Guy Fawkes’s night in the UK. Such demands can be anticipated but there is still no “five year planning” like in the Soviet Union.
Summary
Technocracy and Communism are significantly different from one another. One is centralised and the other is distributed. One is planned and the other is managed and demand driven. A technocratic system can be seen as half way between a free market, capitalist based system and a centralised planned communist system.
References
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