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The Washington Post, September 19, 1995, Separate Pullout. Note: single brackets [ ] are in the Post document.
This text was sent last June to The New York Times and The Washington Post by the person who calls himself "FC," identified by the FBI as the Unabomber, whom authorities have implicated in three murders and 16 bombings. The author threatened to send a bomb to an unspecified destination "with intent to kill " unless one of the newspapers published this manuscript. The Attorney General and the Director of the FBI recommended publication. An article about the decision to publish the document appears on the front page of today's paper.
1. The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. They have greatly increased the life-expectancy of those of us who live in "advanced" countries, but they have destabilized society, have made life unfulfilling, have subjected human beings to indignities, have led to widespread psychological suffering (in the Third World to physical suffering as well) and have inflicted severe damage on the natural world. The continued development of technology will worsen the situation. It will certainly subject human being to greater indignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world, it will probably lead to greater social disruption and psychological suffering, and it may lead to increased physical suffering even in "advanced" countries.
2. The industrial-technological system may survive or it may break down. If it survives, it MAY eventually achieve a low level of physical and psychological suffering, but only after passing through a long and very painful period of adjustment and only at the cost of permanently reducing human beings and many other living organisms to engineered products and mere cogs in the social machine. Furthermore, if the system survives, the consequences will be inevitable: There is no way of reforming or modifying the system so as to prevent it from depriving people of dignity and autonomy.
3. If the system breaks down the consequences will still be very painful. But the bigger the system grows the more disastrous the results of its breakdown will be, so if it is to break down it had best break down sooner rather than later.
4. We therefore advocate a revolution against the industrial system. This revolution may or may not make use of violence; it may be sudden or it may be a relatively gradual process spanning a few decades. We can't predict any of that. But we do outline in a very general way the measures that those who hate the industrial system should take in order to prepare the way for a revolution against that form of society. This is not to be a POLITICAL revolution. Its object will be to overthrow not governments but the economic and technological basis of the present society.
5. In this article we give attention to only some of the negative developments that have grown out of the industrial-technological system. Other such developments we mention only briefly or ignore altogether. This does not mean that we regard these other developments as unimportant. For practical reasons we have to confine our discussion to areas that have received insufficient public attention or in which we have something new to say. For example, since there are well-developed environmental and wilderness movements, we have written very little about environmental degradation or the destruction of wild nature, even though we consider these to be highly important.
6. Almost everyone will agree that we live in a deeply troubled society. One of the most widespread manifestations of the craziness of our world is leftism, so a discussion of the psychology of leftism can serve as an introduction to the discussion of the problems of modern society in general.
7. But what is leftism? During the first half of the 20th century leftism could have been practically identified with socialism. Today the movement is fragmented and it is not clear who can properly be called a leftist. When we speak of leftists in this article we have in mind mainly socialists, collectivists, "politically correct" types, feminists, gay and disability activists, animal rights activists and the like. But not everyone who is associated with one of these movements is a leftist. What we are trying to get at in discussing leftism is not so much movement or an ideology as a psychological type, or rather a collection of related types. Thus, what we mean by "leftism" will emerge more clearly in the course of our discussion of leftist psychology. (Also, see paragraphs 227-230.)
8. Even so, our conception of leftism will remain a good deal less clear than we would wish, but there doesn't seem to be any remedy for this. All we are trying to do here is indicate in a rough and approximate way the two psychological tendencies that we believe are the main driving force of modern leftism. We by no means claim to be telling the WHOLE truth about leftist psychology. Also, our discussion is meant to apply to modern leftism only. We leave open the question of the extent to which our discussion could be applied to the leftists of the 19th and early 20th centuries.
9. The two psychological tendencies that underlie modern leftism we call "feelings of inferiority" and "oversocialization." Feelings of inferiority are characteristic of modern leftism as a whole, while oversocialization is characteristic only of a certain segment of modern leftism; but this segment is highly influential.
10. By "feelings of inferiority" we mean not only inferiority feelings in the strict sense but a whole spectrum of related traits; low self-esteem, feelings of powerlessness, depressive tendencies, defeatism, guilt, self-hatred, etc. We argue that modern leftists tend to have some such feelings (possibly more or less repressed) and that these feelings are decisive in determining the direction of modern leftism.
11. When someone interprets as derogatory almost anything that is said about him (or about groups with whom he identifies) we conclude that he has inferiority feelings or low self-esteem. This tendency is pronounced among minority rights activists, whether or not they belong to the minority groups whose rights they defend. They are hypersensitive about the words used to designate minorities and about anything that is said concerning minorities. The terms "negro," "oriental," "handicapped" or "chick" for an African, an Asian, a disabled person or a woman originally had no derogatory connotation. "Broad" and "chick" were merely the feminine equivalents of "guy," "dude" or "fellow." The negative connotations have been attached to these terms by the activists themselves. Some animal rights activists have gone so far as to reject the word "pet" and insist on its replacement by "animal companion." Leftist anthropologists go to great lengths to avoid saying anything about primitive peoples that could conceivably be interpreted as negative. They want to replace the word "primitive" by "nonliterate." They may seem almost paranoid about anything that might suggest that any primitive culture is inferior to ours. (We do not mean to imply that primitive cultures ARE inferior to ours. We merely point out the hypersensitivity of leftist anthropologists.)
12. Those who are most sensitive about "politically incorrect" terminology are not the average black ghetto-dweller, Asian immigrant, abused woman or disabled person, but a minority of activists, many of whom do not even belong to any "oppressed" group but come from privileged strata of society. Political correctness has its stronghold among university professors, who have secure employment with comfortable salaries, and the majority of whom are heterosexual white males from middle- to upper-middle-class families.
13. Many leftists have an intense identification with the problems of groups that have an image of being weak (women), defeated (American Indians), repellent (homosexuals) or otherwise inferior. The leftists themselves feel that these groups are inferior. They would never admit to themselves that they have such feelings, but it is precisely because they do see these groups as inferior that they identify with their problems. (We do not mean to suggest that women, Indians, etc. ARE inferior; we are only making a point about leftist psychology.)
14. Feminists are desperately anxious to prove that women are as strong and as capable as men. Clearly they are nagged by a fear that women may NOT be as strong and as capable as men.
15. Leftists tend to hate anything that has an image of being strong, good and successful. They hate America, they hate Western civilization, they hate white males, they hate rationality. The reasons that leftists give for hating the West, etc. clearly do not correspond with their real motives. They SAY they hate the West because it is warlike, imperialistic, sexist, ethnocentric and so forth, but where these same faults appear in socialist countries or in primitive cultures, the leftist finds excuses for them, or at best he GRUDGINGLY admits that they exist; whereas he ENTHUSIASTICALLY points out (and often greatly exaggerates) these faults where they appear in Western civilization. Thus it is clear that these faults are not the leftist's real motive for hating America and the West. He hates America and the West because they are strong and successful.
16. Words like "self-confidence," "self-reliance," "initiative," "enterprise," "optimism," etc., play little role in the liberal and leftist vocabulary. The leftist is anti-individualistic, pro-collectivist. He wants society to solve every one's problems for them, satisfy everyone's needs for them, take care of them. He is not the sort of person who has an inner sense of confidence in his ability to solve his own problems and satisfy his own needs. The leftist is antagonistic to the concept of competition because, deep inside, he feels like a loser.
17. Art forms that appeal to modern leftist intellectuals tend to focus on sordidness, defeat and despair, or else they take an orgiastic tone, throwing off rational control as if there were no hope of accomplishing anything through rational calculation and all that was left was to immerse oneself in the sensations of the moment.
18. Modern leftist philosophers tend to dismiss reason, science, objective reality and to insist that everything is culturally relative. It is true that one can ask serious questions about the foundations of scientific knowledge and about how, if at all, the concept of objective reality can be defined. But it is obvious that modern leftist philosophers are not simply cool-headed logicians systematically analyzing the foundations of knowledge. They are deeply involved emotionally in their attack on truth and reality. They attack these concepts because of their own psychological needs. For one thing, their attack is an outlet for hostility, and, to the extent that it is successful, it satisfies the drive for power. More importantly, the leftist hates science and rationality because they classify certain beliefs as true (i.e., successful, superior) and other beliefs as false (i.e., failed, inferior). The leftist's feelings of inferiority run so deep that he cannot tolerate any classification of some things as successful or superior and other things as failed or inferior. This also underlies the rejection by many leftists of the concept of mental illness and of the utility of IQ tests. Leftists are antagonistic to genetic explanations of human abilities or behavior because such explanations tend to make some persons appear superior or inferior to others. Leftists prefer to give society the credit or blame for an individual's ability or lack of it. Thus if a person is "inferior" it is not his fault, but society's, because he has not been brought up properly.
19. The leftist is not typically the kind of person whose feelings of inferiority make him a braggart, an egotist, a bully, a self-promoter, a ruthless competitor. This kind of person has not wholly lost faith in himself. He has a deficit in his sense of power and self-worth, but he can still conceive of himself as having the capacity to be strong, and his efforts to make himself strong produce his unpleasant behavior. [1] But the leftist is too far gone for that. His feelings of inferiority are so ingrained that he cannot conceive of himself as individually strong and valuable. Hence the collectivism of the leftist. He can feel strong only as a member of a large organization or a mass movement with which he identifies himself.
20. Notice the masochistic tendency of leftist tactics. Leftists protest by lying down in front of vehicles, they intentionally provoke police or racists to abuse them, etc. These tactics may often be effective, but many leftists use them not as a means to an end but because they PREFER masochistic tactics. Self-hatred is a leftist trait.
21. Leftists may claim that their activism is motivated by compassion or by moral principles, and moral principle does play a role for the leftist of the oversocialized type. But compassion and moral principle cannot be the main motives for leftist activism. Hostility is too prominent a component of leftist behavior; so is the drive for power. Moreover, much leftist behavior is not rationally calculated to be of benefit to the people whom the leftists claim to be trying to help. For example, if one believes that affirmative action is good for black people, does it make sense to demand affirmative action in hostile or dogmatic terms? Obviously it would be more productive to take a diplomatic and conciliatory approach that would make at least verbal and symbolic concessions to white people who think that affirmative action discriminates against them. But leftist activists do not take such an approach because it would not satisfy their emotional needs. Helping black people is not their real goal. Instead, race problems serve as an excuse for them to express their own hostility and frustrated need for power. In doing so they actually harm black people, because the activists' hostile attitude toward the white majority tends to intensify race hatred.
22. If our society had no social problems at all, the leftists would have to INVENT problems in order to provide themselves with an excuse for making a fuss.
23. We emphasize that the foregoing does not pretend to be an accurate description of everyone who might be considered a leftist. It is only a rough indication of a general tendency of leftism.
24. Psychologists use the term "socialization" to designate the process by which children are trained to think and act as society demands. A person is said to be well socialized if he believes in and obeys the moral code of his society and fits in well as a functioning part of that society. It may seem senseless to say that many leftists are over-socialized, since the leftist is perceived as a rebel. Nevertheless, the position can be defended. Many leftists are not such rebels as they seem.
25. The moral code of our society is so demanding that no one can think, feel and act in a completely moral way. For example, we are not supposed to hate anyone, yet almost everyone hates somebody at some time or other, whether he admits it to himself or not. Some people are so highly socialized that the attempt to think, feel and act morally imposes a severe burden on them. In order to avoid feelings of guilt, they continually have to deceive themselves about their own motives and find moral explanations for feelings and actions that in reality have a nonmoral origin. We use the term "oversocialized" to describe such people. [2]
26. Oversocialization can lead to low self-esteem, a sense of powerlessness, defeatism, guilt, etc. One of the most important means by which our society socializes children is by making them feel ashamed of behavior or speech that is contrary to society's expectations. If this is overdone, or if a particular child is especially susceptible to such feelings, he ends by feeling ashamed of HIMSELF. Moreover the thought and the behavior of the oversocialized person are more restricted by society's expectations than are those of the lightly socialized person. The majority of people engage in a significant amount of naughty behavior. They lie, they commit petty thefts, they break traffic laws, they goof off at work, they hate someone, they say spiteful things or they use some underhanded trick to get ahead of the other guy. The oversocialized person cannot do these things, or if he does do them he generates in himself a sense of shame and self-hatred. The oversocialized person cannot even experience, without guilt, thoughts or feelings that are contrary to the accepted morality; he cannot think "unclean" thoughts. And socialization is not just a matter of morality; we are socialized to conform to many norms of behavior that do not fall under the heading of morality. Thus the oversocialized person is kept on a psychological leash and spends his life running on rails that society has laid down for him. In many oversocialized people this results in a sense of constraint and powerlessness that can be a severe hardship. We suggest that oversocialization is among the more serious cruelties that human being inflict on one another.
27. We argue that a very important and influential segment of the modern left is oversocialized and that their oversocialization is of great importance in determining the direction of modern leftism. Leftists of the oversocialized type tend to be intellectuals or members of the upper-middle class. Notice that university intellectuals [3] constitute the most highly socialized segment of our society and also the most left-wing segment.
28. The leftist of the oversocialized type tries to get off his psychological leash and assert his autonomy by rebelling. But usually he is not strong enough to rebel against the most basic values of society. Generally speaking, the goals of today's leftists are NOT in conflict with the accepted morality. On the contrary, the left takes an accepted moral principle, adopts it as its own, and then accuses mainstream society of violating that principle. Examples: racial equality, equality of the sexes, helping poor people, peace as opposed to war, nonviolence generally, freedom of expression, kindness to animals. More fundamentally, the duty of the individual to serve society and the duty of society to take care of the individual. All these have been deeply rooted values of our society (or at least of its middle and upper classes [4] for a long time. These values are explicitly or implicitly expressed or presupposed in most of the material presented to us by the mainstream communications media and the educational system. Leftists, especially those of the oversocialized type, usually do not rebel against these principles but justify their hostility to society by claiming (with some degree of truth) that society is not living up to these principles.
29. Here is an illustration of the way in which the oversocialized leftist shows his real attachment to the conventional attitudes of our society while pretending to be in rebellion against it. Many leftists push for affirmative action, for moving black people into high-prestige jobs, for improved education in black schools and more money for such schools; the way of life of the black "underclass" they regard as a social disgrace. They want to integrate the black man into the system, make him a business executive, a lawyer, a scientist just like upper-middle-class white people. The leftists will reply that the last thing they want is to make the black man into a copy of the white man; instead, they want to preserve African American culture. But in what does this preservation of African American culture consist? It can hardly consist in anything more than eating black-style food, listening to black-style music, wearing black-style clothing and going to a black-style church or mosque. In other words, it can express itself only in superficial matters. In all ESSENTIAL respects most leftists of the oversocialized type want to make the black man conform to white, middle-class ideals. They want to make him study technical subjects, become an executive or a scientist, spend his life climbing the status ladder to prove that black people are as good as white. They want to make black fathers "responsible," they want black gangs to become nonviolent, etc. But these are exactly the values of the industrial-technological system. The system couldn't care less what kind of music a man listens to, what kind of clothes he wears or what religion he believes in as long as he studies in school, holds a respectable job, climbs the status ladder, is a "responsible" parent, is nonviolent and so forth. In effect, however much he may deny it, the oversocialized leftist wants to integrate the black man into the system and make him adopt its values.
30. We certainly do not claim that leftists, even of the oversocialized type, NEVER rebel against the fundamental values of our society. Clearly they sometimes do. Some oversocialized leftists have gone so far as to rebel against one of modern society's most important principles by engaging in physical violence. By their own account, violence is for them a form of "liberation." In other words, by committing violence they break through the psychological restraints that have been trained into them. Because they are oversocialized these restraints have been more confining for them than for others; hence their need to break free of them. But they usually justify their rebellion in terms of mainstream values. If they engage in violence they claim to be fighting against racism or the like.
31. We realize that many objections could be raised to the foregoing thumbnail sketch of leftist psychology. The real situation is complex, and anything like a complete description of it would take several volumes even if the necessary data were available. We claim only to have indicated very roughly the two most important tendencies in the psychology of modern leftism.
32. The problems of the leftist are indicative of the problems of our society as a whole. Low self-esteem, depressive tendencies and defeatism are not restricted to the left. Though they are especially noticeable in the left, they are widespread in our society. And today's society tries to socialize us to a greater extent than any previous society. We are even told by experts how to eat, how to exercise, how to make love, how to raise our kids and so forth.
33. Human beings have a need (probably based in biology) for something that we will call the "power process." This is closely related to the need for power (which is widely recognized) but is not quite the same thing. The power process has four elements. The three most clear-cut of these we call goal, effort and attainment of goal. (Everyone needs to have goals whose attainment requires effort, and needs to succeed in attaining at least some of his goals.) The fourth element is more difficult to define and may not be necessary for everyone. We call it autonomy and will discuss it later (paragraphs 42-44).
34. Consider the hypothetical case of a man who can have anything he wants just by wishing for it. Such a man has power, but he will develop serious psychological problems. At first he will have a lot of fun, but by and by he will become acutely bored and demoralized. Eventually he may become clinically depressed. History shows that leisured aristocracies tend to become decadent. This is not true of fighting aristocracies that have to struggle to maintain their power. But leisured, secure aristocracies that have no need to exert themselves usually become bored, hedonistic and demoralized, even though they have power. This shows that power is not enough. One must have goals toward which to exercise one's power.
35. Everyone has goals; if nothing else, to obtain the physical necessities of life: food, water and whatever clothing and shelter are made necessary by the climate. But the leisured aristocrat obtains these things without effort. Hence his boredom and demoralization.
36. Nonattainment of important goals results in death if the goals are physical necessities, and in frustration if nonattainment of the goals is compatible with survival. Consistent failure to attain goals throughout life results in defeatism, low self-esteem or depression.
37. Thus, in order to avoid serious psychological problems, a human being needs goals whose attainment requires effort, and he must have a reasonable rate of success in attaining his goals.
38. But not every leisured aristocrat becomes bored and demoralized. For example, the emperor Hirohito, instead of sinking into decadent hedonism, devoted himself to marine biology, a field in which he became distinguished. When people do not have to exert themselves to satisfy their physical needs they often set up artificial goals for themselves. In many cases they then pursue these goals with the same energy and emotional involvement that they otherwise would have put into the search for physical necessities. Thus the aristocrats of the Roman Empire had their literary pretensions; many European aristocrats a few centuries ago invested tremendous time and energy in hunting, though they certainly didn't need the meat; other aristocracies have competed for status through elaborate displays of wealth; and a few aristocrats, like Hirohito, have turned to science.
39. We use the term "surrogate activity" to designate an activity that is directed toward an artificial goal that people set up for themselves merely in order to have some goal to work toward, or let us say, merely for the sake of the "fulfillment" that they get from pursuing the goal. Here is a rule of thumb for the identification of surrogate activities. Given a person who devotes much time and energy to the pursuit of goal X, ask yourself this: If he had to devote most of his time and energy to satisfying his biological needs, and if that effort required him to use his physical and mental faculties in a varied and interesting way, would he feel seriously deprived because he did not attain goal X? If the answer is no, then the person's pursuit of goal X is a surrogate activity. Hirohito's studies in marine biology clearly constituted a surrogate activity, since it is pretty certain that if Hirohito had had to spend his time working at interesting non-scientific tasks in order to obtain the necessities of life, he would not have felt deprived because he didn't know all about the anatomy and life-cycles of marine animals. On the other hand the pursuit of sex and love (for example) is not a surrogate activity, because most people, even if their existence were otherwise satisfactory, would feel deprived if they passed their lives without ever having a relationship with a member of the opposite sex. (But pursuit of an excessive amount of sex, more than one really needs, can be a surrogate activity.)
40. In modern industrial society only minimal effort is necessary to satisfy one's physical needs. It is enough to go through a training program to acquire some petty technical skill, then come to work on time and exert the very modest effort needed to hold a job. The only requirements are a moderate amount of intelligence and, most of all, simple OBEDIENCE. If one has those, society takes care of one from cradle to grave. (Yes, there is an underclass that cannot take the physical necessities for granted, but we are speaking here of mainstream society.) Thus it is not surprising that modern society is full of surrogate activities. These include scientific work, athletic achievement, humanitarian work, artistic and literary creation, climbing the corporate ladder, acquisition of money and material goods far beyond the point at which they cease to give any additional physical satisfaction, and social activism when it addresses issues that are not important for the activist personally, as in the case of white activists who work for the rights of nonwhite minorities. These are not always PURE surrogate activities, since for many people they may be motivated in part by needs other than the need to have some goal to pursue. Scientific work may be motivated in part by a drive for prestige, artistic creation by a need to express feelings, militant social activism by hostility. But for most people who pursue them, these activities are in large part surrogate activities. For example, the majority of scientists will probably agree that the "fulfillment" they get from their work is more important than the money and prestige they earn.
41. For many if not most people, surrogate activities are less satisfying than the pursuit of real goals (that is, goals that people would want to attain even if their need for the power process were already fulfilled). One indication of this is the fact that, in many or most cases, people who are deeply involved in surrogate activities are never satisfied, never at rest. Thus the money-maker constantly strives for more and more wealth. The scientist no sooner solves one problem than he moves on to the next. The long-distance runner drives himself to run always farther and faster. Many people who pursue surrogate activities will say that they get far more fulfillment from these activities than they do from the "mundane" business of satisfying their biological needs, but that is because in our society the effort needed to satisfy the biological needs has been reduced to triviality. More importantly, in our society people do not satisfy their biological needs AUTONOMOUSLY but by functioning as parts of an immense social machine. In contrast, people generally have a great deal of autonomy in pursuing their surrogate activities.
42. Autonomy as a part of the power process may not be necessary for every individual. But most people need a greater or lesser degree of autonomy in working toward their goals. Their efforts must be undertaken on their own initiative and must be under their own direction and control. Yet most people do not have to exert this initiative, direction and control as single individuals. It is usually enough to act as a member of a SMALL group. Thus if half a dozen people discuss a goal among themselves and make a successful joint effort to attain that goal, their need for the power process will be served. But if they work under rigid orders handed down from above that leave them no room for autonomous decision and initiative, then their need for the power process will not be served. The same is true when decisions are made on a collective basis if the group making the collective decision is so large that the role of each individual is insignificant. [5]
43. It is true that some individuals seem to have little need for autonomy. Either their drive for power is weak or they satisfy it by identifying themselves with some powerful organization to which they belong. And then there are unthinking, animal types who seem to be satisfied with a purely physical sense of power (the good combat soldier, who gets his sense of power by developing fighting skills that he is quite content to use in blind obedience to his superiors).
44. But for most people it is through the power process having a goal, making an AUTONOMOUS effort and attaining the goal -- that self-esteem, self-confidence and a sense of power are acquired. When one does not have adequate opportunity to go through the power process the consequences are (depending on the individual and on the way the power process is disrupted) boredom, demoralization, low self-esteem, inferiority feelings, defeatism, depression, anxiety, guilt, frustration, hostility, spouse or child abuse, insatiable hedonism, abnormal sexual behavior, sleep disorders, eating disorders. etc. [6]
45. Any of the foregoing symptoms can occur in any society, but in modern industrial society they are present on a massive scale. We aren't the first to mention that the world today seems to be going crazy. This sort of thing is not normal for human societies. There is good reason to believe that primitive man suffered from less stress and frustration and was better satisfied with his way of life than modern man is. It is true that not all was sweetness and light in primitive societies. Abuse of women was common among the Australian aborigines, transsexuality was fairly common among some of the American Indian tribes. But it does appear that GENERALLY SPEAKING the kinds of problems that we have listed in the preceding paragraph were far less common among primitive peoples than they are in modern society.
46. We attribute the social and psychological problems of modern society to the fact that that society requires people to live under conditions radically different from those under which the human race evolved and to behave in ways that conflict with the patterns of behavior that the human race developed while living under the earlier conditions. It is clear from what we have already written that we consider lack of opportunity to properly experience the power process as the most important of the abnormal conditions to which modern society subjects people. But it is not the only one. Before dealing with disruption of the power process as a source of social problems we will discuss some of the other sources.
47. Among the abnormal conditions present in modern industrial society are excessive density of population, isolation of man from nature, excessive rapidity of social change and the breakdown of natural small-scale communities such as the extended family, the village or the tribe.
48. It is well known that crowding increases stress and aggression. The degree of crowding that exists today and the isolation of man from nature are consequences of technological progress. All pre-industrial societies were predominantly rural. The Industrial Revolution vastly increased the size of cities and the proportion of the population that lives in them, and modern agricultural technology has made it possible for the Earth to support a far denser population than it ever did before. (Also, technology exacerbates the effects of crowding because it puts increased disruptive powers in people's hands. For example, a variety of noise-making devices: power mowers, radios, motorcycles, etc. If the use of these devices is unrestricted, people who want peace and quiet are frustrated by the noise. If their use is restricted, people who use the devices are frustrated by the regulations. But if these machines had never been invented there would have been no conflict and no frustration generated by them.)
49. For primitive societies the natural world (which usually changes only slowly) provided a stable framework and therefore a sense of security. In the modern world it is human society that dominates nature rather than the other way around, and modern society changes very rapidly owing to technological change. Thus there is no stable framework.
50. The conservatives are fools: They whine about the decay of traditional values, yet they enthusiastically support technological progress and economic growth. Apparently it never occurs to them that you can't make rapid, drastic changes in the technology and the economy of a society without causing rapid changes in all other aspects of the society as well, and that such rapid changes inevitably break down traditional values.
51. The breakdown of traditional values to some extent implies the breakdown of the bonds that hold together traditional small-scale social groups. The disintegration of small-scale social groups is also promoted by the fact that modern conditions often require or tempt individuals to move to new locations, separating themselves from their communities. Beyond that, a technological society HAS TO weaken family ties and local communities if it is to function efficiently. In modern society an individual's loyalty must be first to the system and only secondarily to a small-scale community, because if the internal loyalties of small-scale communities were stronger than loyalty to the system, such communities would pursue their own advantage at the expense of the system.
52. Suppose that a public official or a corporation executive appoints his cousin, his friend or his co-religionist to a position rather than appointing the person best qualified for the job. He has permitted personal loyalty to supersede his loyalty to the system, and that is "nepotism" or "discrimination," both of which are terrible sins in modern society. Would-be industrial societies that have done a poor job of subordinating personal or local loyalties to loyalty to the system are usually very inefficient. (Look at Latin America.) Thus an advanced industrial society can tolerate only those small-scale communities that are emasculated, tamed and made into tools of the system. [7]
53. Crowding, rapid change and the breakdown of communities have been widely recognized as sources of social problems. But we do not believe they are enough to account for the extent of the problems that are seen today.
54. A few pre-industrial cities were very large and crowded, yet their inhabitants do not seem to have suffered from psychological problems to the same extent as modern man. In America today there still are uncrowded rural areas, and we find there the same problems as in urban areas, though the problems tend to be less acute in the rural areas. Thus crowding does not seem to be the decisive factor.
55. On the growing edge of the American frontier during the 19th century, the mobility of the population probably broke down extended families and small-scale social groups to at least the same extent as these are broken down today. In fact, many nuclear families lived by choice in such isolation, having no neighbors within several miles, that they belonged to no community at all, yet they do not seem to have developed problems as a result.
56. Furthermore, change in American frontier society was very rapid and deep. A man might be born and raised in a log cabin, outside the reach of law and order and fed largely on wild meat; and by the time he arrived at old age he might be working at a regular job and living in an ordered community with effective law enforcement. This was a deeper change than that which typically occurs in the life of a modern individual, yet it does not seem to have led to psychological problems. In fact, 19th century American society had an optimistic and self-confident tone, quite unlike that of today's society. [8]
57. The difference, we argue, is that modern man has the sense (largely justified) that change is IMPOSED on him, whereas the 19th century frontiersman had the sense (also largely justified) that he created change himself, by his own choice. Thus a pioneer settled on a piece of land of his own choosing and made it into a farm through his own effort. In those days an entire county might have only a couple of hundred inhabitants and was a far more isolated and autonomous entity than a modern county is. Hence the pioneer farmer participated as a member of a relatively small group in the creation of a new, ordered community. One may well question whether the creation of this community was an improvement, but at any rate it satisfied the pioneer's need for the power process.
58. It would be possible to give other examples of societies in which there has been rapid change and/or lack of close community ties without the kind of massive behavioral aberration that is seen in today's industrial society. We contend that the most important cause of social and psychological problems in modern society is the fact that people have insufficient opportunity to go through the power process in a normal way. We don't mean to say that modern society is the only one in which the power process has been disrupted. Probably most if not all civilized societies have interfered with the power process to a greater or lesser extent. But in modern industrial society the problem has become particularly acute. Leftism, at least in its recent (mid- to late-20th century) form, is in part a symptom of deprivation with respect to the power process.
59. We divide human drives into three groups: (1) those drives that can be satisfied with minimal effort; (2) those that can be satisfied but only at the cost of serious effort; (3) those that cannot be adequately satisfied no matter how much effort one makes. The power process is the process of satisfying the drives of the second group. The more drives there are in the third group, the more there is frustration, anger, eventually defeatism, depression, etc.
60. In modern industrial society natural human drives tend to be pushed into the first and third groups, and the second group tends to consist increasingly of artificially created drives.
61. In primitive societies, physical necessities generally fall into group 2: They can be obtained, but only at the cost of serious effort. But modern society tends to guaranty the physical necessities to everyone [9] in exchange for only minimal effort, hence physical needs are pushed into group 1. (There may be disagreement about whether the effort needed to hold a job is "minimal"; but usually, in lower- to middle-level jobs, whatever effort is required is merely that of OBEDIENCE. You sit or stand where you are told to sit or stand and do what you are told to do in the way you are told to do it. Seldom do you have to exert yourself seriously, and in any case you have hardly any autonomy in work, so that the need for the power process is not well served.)
62. Social needs, such as sex, love and status, often remain in group 2 in modern society, depending on the situation of the individual. [10] But, except for people who have a particularly strong drive for status, the effort required to fulfill the social drives is insufficient to satisfy adequately the need for the power process.
63. So certain artificial needs have been created that fall into group 2, hence serve the need for the power process. Advertising and marketing techniques have been developed that make many people feel they need things that their grandparents never desired or even dreamed of. It requires serious effort to earn enough money to satisfy these artificial needs, hence they fall into group 2. (But see paragraphs 80-82.) Modern man must satisfy his need for the power process largely through pursuit of the artificial needs created by the advertising and marketing industry [11], and through surrogate activities.
64. It seems that for many people, maybe the majority, these artificial forms of the power process are insufficient. A theme that appears repeatedly in the writings of the social critics of the second half of the 20th century is the sense of purposelessness that afflicts many people in modern society. (This purposelessness is often called by other names such as "anomic" or "middle-class vacuity.") We suggest that the so-called "identity crisis" is actually a search for a sense of purpose, often for commitment to a suitable surrogate activity. It may be that existentialism is in large part a response to the purposelessness of modern life. [12] Very widespread in modern society is the search for "fulfillment." But we think that for the majority of people an activity whose main goal is fulfillment (that is, a surrogate activity) does not bring completely satisfactory fulfillment. In other words, it does not fully satisfy the need for the power process. (See paragraph 41.) That need can be fully satisfied only through activities that have some external goal, such as physical necessities, sex, love, status, revenge, etc.
65. Moreover, where goals are pursued through earning money, climbing the status ladder or functioning as part of the system in some other way, most people are not in a position to pursue their goals AUTONOMOUSLY. Most workers are someone else's employee and, as we pointed out in paragraph 61, must spend their days doing what they are told to do in the way they are told to do it. Even people who are in business for themselves have only limited autonomy. It is a chronic complaint of small-business persons and entrepreneurs that their hands are tied by excessive government regulation. Some of these regulations are doubtless unnecessary, but for the most part government regulations are essential and inevitable parts of our extremely complex society. A large portion of small business today operates on the franchise system. It was reported in the Wall Street Journal a few years ago that many of the franchise-granting companies require applicants for franchises to take a personality test that is designed to EXCLUDE those who have creativity and initiative, because such persons are not sufficiently docile to go along obediently with the franchise system. This excludes from small business many of the people who most need autonomy.
66. Today people live more by virtue of what the system does FOR them or TO them than by virtue of what they do for themselves. And what they do for themselves is done more and more along channels laid down by the system. Opportunities tend to be those that the system provides, the opportunities must be exploited in accord with rules and regulations [13], and techniques prescribed by experts must be followed if there is to be a chance of success.
67. Thus the power process is disrupted in our society through a deficiency of real goals and a deficiency of autonomy in the pursuit of goals. But it is also disrupted because of those human drives that fall into group 3: the drives that one cannot adequately satisfy no matter how much effort one makes. One of these drives is the need for security. Our lives depend on decisions made by other people; we have no control over these decisions and usually we do not even know the people who make them. ("We live in a world in which relatively few people -- maybe 500 or 1,000 make the important decisions" -- Philip B. Heymann of Harvard Law School, quoted by Anthony Lewis, New York Times, April 21, 1995.) Our lives depend on whether safety standards at a nuclear power plant are properly maintained; on how much pesticide is allowed to get into our food or how much pollution into our air; on how skillful (or incompetent) our doctor is; whether we lose or get a job may depend on decisions made by government economists or corporation executives; and so forth. Most individuals are not in a position to secure themselves against these threats to more [than] a very limited extent. The individual's search for security is therefore frustrated, which leads to a sense of powerlessness.
68. It may be objected that primitive man is physically less secure than modern man, as is shown by his shorter life expectancy; hence modern man suffers from less, not more than the amount of insecurity that is normal for human beings. But psychological security does not closely correspond with physical security. What makes us FEEL secure is not so much objective security as a sense of confidence in our ability to take care of ourselves. Primitive man, threatened by a fierce animal or by hunger, can fight in self-defense or travel in search of food. He has no certainty of success in these efforts, but he is by no means helpless against the things that threaten him. The modern individual on the other hand is threatened by many things against which he is helpless: nuclear accidents, carcinogens in food, environmental pollution, war, increasing taxes, invasion of his privacy by large organizations, nationwide social or economic phenomena that may disrupt his way of life.
69. It is true that primitive man is powerless against some of the things that threaten him; disease for example. But he can accept the risk of disease stoically. It is part of the nature of things, it is no one's fault, unless it is the fault of some imaginary, impersonal demon. But threats to the modern individual tend to be MAN-MADE. They are not the results of chance but are IMPOSED on him by other persons whose decisions he, as an individual, is unable to influence. Consequently he feels frustrated, humiliated and angry.
70. Thus primitive man for the most part has his security in his own hands (either as an individual or as a member of a SMALL group) whereas the security of modern man is in the hands of persons or organizations that are too remote or too large for him to be able personally to influence them. So modern man's drive for security tends to fall into groups 1 and 3; in some areas (food, shelter etc.) his security is assured at the cost of only trivial effort, whereas in other areas he CANNOT attain security. (The foregoing greatly simplifies the real situation, but it does indicate in a rough, general way how the condition of modern man differs from that of primitive man.)
71. People have many transitory drives or impulses that are necessarily frustrated in modern life, hence fall into group 3. One may become angry, but modern society cannot permit fighting. In many situations it does not even permit verbal aggression. When going somewhere one may be in a hurry, or one may be in a mood to travel slowly, but one generally has no choice but to move with the flow of traffic and obey the traffic signals. One may want to do one's work in a different way, but usually one can work only according to the rules laid down by one's employer. In many other ways as well, modern man is strapped down by a network of rules and regulations (explicit or implicit) that frustrate many of his impulses and thus interfere with the power process. Most of these regulations cannot be dispensed with, because they are necessary for the functioning of industrial society.
72. Modern society is in certain respects extremely permissive. In matters that are irrelevant to the functioning of the system we can generally do what we please. We can believe in any religion (as long as it does not encourage behavior that is dangerous to the system). We can go to bed with anyone we like (as long as we practice "safe sex"). We can do anything we like as long as it is UNIMPORTANT. But in all IMPORTANT matters the system tends increasingly to regulate our behavior.
73. Behavior is regulated not only through explicit rules and not only by the government. Control is often exercised through indirect coercion or through psychological pressure or manipulation, and by organizations other than the government, or by the system as a whole. Most large organizations use some form of propaganda [14] to manipulate public attitudes or behavior. Propaganda is not limited to "commercials" and advertisements, and sometimes it is not even consciously intended as propaganda by the people who make it. For instance, the content of entertainment programming is a powerful form of propaganda. An example of indirect coercion: There is no law that says we have to go to work every day and follow our employer's orders. Legally there is nothing to prevent us from going to live in the wild like primitive people or from going into business for ourselves. But in practice there is very little wild country left, and there is room in the economy for only a limited number of small business owners. Hence most of us can survive only as someone else's employee.
74. We suggest that modern man's obsession with longevity, and with maintaining physical vigor and sexual attractiveness to an advanced age, is a symptom of unfulfillment resulting from deprivation with respect to the power process. The "mid-life crisis" also is such a symptom. So is the lack of interest in having children that is fairly common in modern society but almost unheard-of in primitive societies.
75. In primitive societies life is a succession of stages. The needs and purposes of one stage having been fulfilled, there is no particular reluctance about passing on to the next stage. A young man goes through the power process by becoming a hunter, hunting not for sport or for fulfillment but to get meat that is necessary for food. (In young women the process is more complex, with greater emphasis on social power; we won't discuss that here.) This phase having been successfully passed through, the young man has no reluctance about settling down to the responsibilities of raising a family. (In contrast, some modern people indefinitely postpone having children because they are too busy seeking some kind of "fulfillment." We suggest that the fulfillment they need is adequate experience of the power process -- with real goals instead of the artificial goals of surrogate activities.) Again, having successfully raised his children, going through the power process by providing them with the physical necessities, the primitive man feels that his work is done and he is prepared to accept old age (if he survives that long) and death. Any modern people, on the other hand, are disturbed by the prospect of physical deterioration and death, as is shown by the amount of effort they expend trying to maintain their physical condition, appearance and health. We argue that this is due to unfulfillment resulting from the fact that they have never put their physical powers to any practical use, have never gone through the power process using their bodies in a serious way. It is not the primitive man, who has used his body daily for practical purposes, who fears the deterioration of age, but the modern man, who has never had a practical use for his body beyond walking from his car to his house. It is the man whose need for the power process has been satisfied during his life who is best prepared to accept the end of that life.
76. In response to the arguments of this section someone will say, "Society must find a way to give people the opportunity to go through the power process." For such people the value of the opportunity is destroyed by the very fact that society gives it to them. What they need is to find or make their own opportunities. As long as the system GIVES them their opportunities it still has them on a leash. To attain autonomy they must get off that leash.
77. Not everyone in industrial-technological society suffers from psychological problems. Some people even profess to be quite satisfied with society as it is. We now discuss some of the reasons why people differ so greatly in their response to modern society.
78. First, there doubtless are differences in the strength of the drive for power. Individuals with a weak drive for power may have relatively little need to go through the power process, or at least relatively little need for autonomy in the power process. These are docile types who would have been happy as plantation darkies in the Old South. (We don't mean to sneer at the "plantation darkies" of the Old South. To their credit, most of the slaves were NOT content with their servitude. We do sneer at people who ARE content with servitude.)
79. Some people may have some exceptional drive, in pursuing which they satisfy their need for the power process. For example, those who have an unusually strong drive for social status may spend their whole lives climbing the status ladder without ever getting bored with that game.
80. People vary in their susceptibility to advertising and marketing techniques. Some are so susceptible that, even if they make a great deal of money, they cannot satisfy their constant craving for the the shiny new toys that the marketing industry dangles before their eyes. So they always feel hard-pressed financially even if their income is large, and their cravings are frustrated.
81. Some people have low susceptibility to advertising and marketing techniques. These are the people who aren't interested in money. Material acquisition does not serve their need for the power process.
82. People who have medium susceptibility to advertising and marketing techniques are able to earn enough money to satisfy their craving for goods and services, but only at the cost of serious effort (putting in overtime, taking a second job, earning promotions, etc.). Thus material acquisition serves their need for the power process. But it does not necessarily follow that their need is fully satisfied. They may have insufficient autonomy in the power process (their work may consist of following orders) and some of their drives may be frustrated (e.g., security, aggression). (We are guilty of oversimplification in paragraphs 80-82 because we have assumed that the desire for material acquisition is entirely a creation of the advertising and marketing industry. Of course it's not that simple. [11]
83. Some people partly satisfy their need for power by identifying themselves with a powerful organization or mass movement. An individual lacking goals or power joins a movement or an organization, adopts its goals as his own, then works toward those goals. When some of the goals are attained, the individual, even though his personal efforts have played only an insignificant part in the attainment of the goals, feels (through his identification with the movement or organization) as if he had gone through the power process. This phenomenon was exploited by the fascists, Nazis and communists. Our society uses it too, though less crudely. Example: Manuel Noriega was an irritant to the U.S. (goal: punish Noriega). The U.S. invaded Panama (effort) and punished Noriega (attainment of goal). Thus the U.S. went through the power process and many Americans, because of their identification with the U.S., experienced the power process vicariously. Hence the widespread public approval of the Panama invasion; it gave people a sense of power. [15] We see the same phenomenon in armies, corporations, political parties, humanitarian organizations, religious or ideological movements. In particular, leftist movements tend to attract people who are seeking to satisfy their need for power. But for most people identification with a large organization or a mass movement does not fully satisfy the need for power.
84. Another way in which people satisfy their need for the power process is through surrogate activities. As we explained in paragraphs 38-40, a surrogate activity is an activity that is directed toward an artificial goal that the individual pursues for the sake of the "fulfillment" that he gets from pursuing the goal, not because he needs to attain the goal itself. For instance, there is no practical motive for building enormous muscles, hitting a little ball into a hole or acquiring a complete series of postage stamps. Yet many people in our society devote themselves with passion to bodybuilding, golf or stamp-collecting. Some people are more "other-directed" than others, and therefore will more readily attach importance to a surrogate activity simply because the people around them treat it as important or because society tells them it is important. That is why some people get very serious about essentially trivial activities such as sports, or bridge, or chess, or arcane scholarly pursuits, whereas others who are more clear-sighted never see these things as anything but the surrogate activities that they are, and consequently never attach enough importance to them to satisfy their need for the power process in that way. It only remains to point out that in many cases a person's way of earning a living is also a surrogate activity. Not a PURE surrogate activity, since part of the motive for the activity is to gain the physical necessities and (for some people) social status and the luxuries that advertising makes them want. But many people put into their work far more effort than is necessary to earn whatever money and status they require, and this extra effort constitutes a surrogate activity. This extra effort, together with the emotional investment that accompanies it, is one of the most potent forces acting toward the continual development and perfecting of the system, with negative consequences for individual freedom (see paragraph 131). Especially, for the most creative scientists and engineers, work tends to be largely a surrogate activity. This point is so important that it deserves a separate discussion, which we shall give in a moment (paragraphs 87-92).
85. In this section we have explained how many people in modern society do satisfy their need for the power process to a greater or lesser extent. But we think that for the majority of people the need for the power process is not fully satisfied. In the first place, those who have an insatiable drive for status, or who get firmly "hooked" on a surrogate activity, or who identify strongly enough with a movement or organization to satisfy their need for power in that way, are exceptional personalities. Others are not fully satisfied with surrogate activities or by identification with an organization (see paragraphs 41, 64). In the second place, too much control is imposed by the system through explicit regulation or through socialization, which results in a deficiency of autonomy, and in frustration due to the impossibility of attaining certain goals and the necessity of restraining too many impulses.
86. But even if most people in industrial-technological society were well satisfied, we (FC) would still be opposed to that form of society, because (among other reasons) we consider it demeaning to fulfill one's need for the power process through surrogate activities or through identification with an organization, rather than through pursuit of real goals.
87
88. The "benefit of humanity" explanation doesn't work
any better. Some scientific work has no conceivable
relation to the welfare of the human race most of
archaeology or comparative linguistics for example. Some
other areas of science present obviously dangerous
possibilities. Yet scientists in these areas are just as
enthusiastic about their work as those who develop
vaccines or study air pollution. Consider the case of Dr.
Edward Teller, who had an obvious emotional involvement
in promoting nuclear power plants. Did this involvement
stem from a desire to benefit humanity? If so, then why
didn't Dr. Teller get emotional about other
"humanitarian" causes? If he was such a humanitarian then
why did he help to develop the H-bomb? As with many other
scientific achievements, it is very much open to question
whether nuclear power plants actually do benefit
humanity. Does the cheap electricity outweigh the
accumulating waste and the risk of accidents? Dr. Teller
saw only one side of the question. Clearly his emotional
involvement with nuclear power arose not from a desire to
"benefit humanity" but from a personal fulfillment he got
from his work and from seeing it put to practical use.
89. The same is true of scientists generally. With
possible rare exceptions, their motive is neither
curiosity nor a desire to benefit humanity but the need
to go through the power process: to have a goal (a
scientific problem to solve), to make an effort
(research) and to attain the goal (solution of the
problem.) Science is a surrogate activity because
scientists work mainly for the fulfillment they get out
of the work itself.
90. Of course, it's not that simple. Other motives do
play a role for many scientists. Money and status for
example. Some scientists may be persons of the type who
have an insatiable drive for status (see paragraph 79)
and this may provide much of the motivation for their
work. No doubt the majority of scientists, like the
majority of the general population, are more or less
susceptible to advertising and marketing techniques and
need money to satisfy their craving for goods and
services. Thus science is not a PURE surrogate activity.
But it is in large part a surrogate activity.
91. Also, science and technology constitute a power mass
movement, and many scientists gratify their need for
power through identification with this mass movement (see
paragraph 83).
92. Thus science marches on blindly, without regard to
the real welfare of the human race or to any other
standard, obedient only to the psychological needs of the
scientists and of the government officials and
corporation executives who provide the funds for
research.
93. We are going to argue that industrial-technological
society cannot be reformed in such a way as to prevent it
from progressively narrowing the sphere of human freedom.
But, because "freedom" is a word that can be interpreted
in many ways, we must first make clear what kind of
freedom we are concerned with.
94. By "freedom" we mean the opportunity to go through
the power process, with real goals not the artificial
goals of surrogate activities, and without interference,
manipulation or supervision from anyone, especially from
any large organization. Freedom means being in control
(either as an individual or as a member of a SMALL group)
of the life-and-death issues of one's existence; food,
clothing, shelter and defense against whatever threats
there may be in one's environment. Freedom means having
power; not the power to control other people but the
power to control the circumstances of one's own life. One
does not have freedom if anyone else (especially a large
organization) has power over one, no matter how
benevolently, tolerantly and permissively that power may
be exercised. It is important not to confuse freedom with
mere permissiveness (see paragraph 72
95. It is said that we live in a free society because we
have a certain number of constitutionally guaranteed
rights. But these are not as important as they seem. The
degree of personal freedom that exists in a society is
determined more by the economic and technological
structure of the society than by its laws or its form of
government. [16] Most of the Indian nations of New
England were monarchies, and many of the cities of the
Italian Renaissance were controlled by dictators. But in
reading about these societies one gets the impression
that they allowed far more personal freedom than our
society does. In part this was because they lacked
efficient mechanisms for enforcing the ruler's will:
There were no modern, well-organized police forces, no
rapid long-distance communications, no surveillance
cameras, no dossiers of information about the lives of
average citizens. Hence it was relatively easy to evade
control.
96. As for our constitutional rights, consider for
example that of freedom of the press. We certainly don't
mean to knock that right; it is very important tool for
limiting concentration of political power and for keeping
those who do have political power in line by publicly
exposing any misbehavior on their part. But freedom of
the press is of very little use to the average citizen as
an individual. The mass media are mostly under the
control of large organizations that are integrated into
the system. Anyone who has a little money can have
something printed, or can distribute it on the Internet
or in some such way, but what he has to say will be
swamped by the vast volume of material put out by the
media, hence it will have no practical effect. To make an
impression on society with words is therefore almost
impossible for most individuals and small groups. Take us
(FC) for example. If we had never done anything violent
and had submitted the present writings to a publisher,
they probably would not have been accepted. If they had
been been accepted and published, they probably would not
have attracted many readers, because it's more fun to
watch the entertainment put out by the media than to read
a sober essay. Even if these writings had had many
readers, most of these readers would soon have forgotten
what they had read as their minds were flooded by the
mass of material to which the media expose them. In order
to get our message before the public with some chance of
making a lasting impression, we've had to kill people.
97. Constitutional rights are useful up to a point, but
they do not serve to guarantee much more than what might
be called the bourgeois conception of freedom. According
to the bourgeois conception, a "free" man is essentially
an element of a social machine and has only a certain set
of prescribed and delimited freedoms; freedoms that are
designed to serve the needs of the social machine more
than those of the individual. Thus the bourgeois's "free"
man has economic freedom because that promotes growth and
progress; he has freedom of the press because public
criticism restrains misbehavior by political leaders; he
has a right to a fair trial because imprisonment at the
whim of the powerful would be bad for the system. This
was clearly the attitude of Simon Bolivar. To him, people
deserved liberty only if they used it to promote progress
(progress as conceived by the bourgeois). Other bourgeois
thinkers have taken a similar view of freedom as a mere
means to collective ends. Chester C. Tan, "Chinese
Political Thought in the Twentieth Century," page 202,
explains the philosophy of the Kuomintang leader Hu
Han-min: "An individual is granted rights because he is
a member of society and his community life requires such
rights. By community Hu meant the whole society of the
nation." And on page 259 Tan states that according to
Carsum Chang (Chang Chun-mai, head of the State Socialist
Party in China) freedom had to be used in the interest of
the state and of the people as a whole. But what kind of
freedom does one have if one can use it only as someone
else prescribes? FC's conception of freedom is not that
of Bolivar, Hu, Chang or other bourgeois theorists. The
trouble with such theorists is that they have made the
development and application of social theories their
surrogate activity. Consequently the theories are
designed to serve the needs of the theorists more than
the needs of any people who may be unlucky enough to live
in a society on which the theories are imposed.
98. One more point to be made in this section: It should
not be assumed that a person has enough freedom just
because he SAYS he has enough. Freedom is restricted in
part by psychological controls of which people are
unconscious, and moreover many people's ideas of what
constitutes freedom are governed more by social
convention than by their real needs. For example, it's
likely that many leftists of the oversocialized type
would say that most people, including themselves, are
socialized too little rather than too much, yet the
oversocialized leftist pays a heavy psychological price
for his high level of socialization.
99. Think of history as being the sum of two components:
an erratic component that consists of unpredictable
events that follow no discernible pattern, and a regular
component that consists of long-term historical trends.
Here we are concerned with the long-term trends.
100. FIRST PRINCIPLE. If a SMALL change is made that
affects a long-term historical trend, then the effect of
that change will almost always be transitory -- the trend
will soon revert to its original state. (Example: A
reform movement designed to clean up political corruption
in a society rarely has more than a short-term effect;
sooner or later the reformers relax and corruption creeps
back in. The level of political corruption in a given
society tends to remain constant, or to change only
slowly with the evolution of the society. Normally, a
political cleanup will be permanent only if accompanied
by widespread social changes; a SMALL change in the
society won't be enough.) If a small change in a
long-term historical trend appears to be permanent, it is
only because the change acts in the direction in which
the trend is already moving, so that the trend is not
altered but only pushed a step ahead.
101. The first principle is almost a tautology. If a
trend were not stable with respect to small changes, it
would wander at random rather than following a definite
direction; in other words it would not be a long-term
trend at all.
102. SECOND PRINCIPLE. If a change is made that is
sufficiently large to alter permanently a long-term
historical trend, then it will alter the society as a
whole. In other words, a society is a system in which all
parts are interrelated, and you can't permanently change
any important part without changing all other parts as
well.
103. THIRD PRINCIPLE. If a change is made that is large
enough to alter permanently a long-term trend, then the
consequences for the society as a whole cannot be
predicted in advance. (Unless various other societies
have passed through the same change and have all
experienced the same consequences, in which case one can
predict on empirical grounds that another society that
passes through the same change will be like to experience
similar consequences.)
104. FOURTH PRINCIPLE. A new kind of society cannot be
designed on paper. That is, you cannot plan out a new
form of society in advance, then set it up and expect it
to function as it was designed to do.
105. The third and fourth principles result from the
complexity of human societies. A change in human behavior
will affect the economy of a society and its physical
environment; the economy will affect the environment and
vice versa, and the changes in the economy and the
environment will affect human behavior in complex,
unpredictable ways; and so forth. The network of causes
and effects is far too complex to be untangled and
understood.
106. FIFTH PRINCIPLE. People do not consciously and
rationally choose the form of their society. Societies
develop through processes of social evolution that are
not under rational human control.
107. The fifth principle is a consequence of the other
four.
108. To illustrate: By the first principle, generally
speaking an attempt at social reform either acts in the
direction in which the society is developing anyway (so
that it merely accelerates a change that would have
occurred in any case) or else it has only a transitory
effect, so that the society soon slips back into its old
groove. To make a lasting change in the direction of
development of any important aspect of a society, reform
is insufficient and revolution is required. (A revolution
does not necessarily involve an armed uprising or the
overthrow of a government.) By the second principle, a
revolution never changes only one aspect of a society, it
changes the whole society; and by the third principle
changes occur that were never expected or desired by the
revolutionaries. By the fourth principle, when
revolutionaries or utopians set up a new kind of society,
it never works out as planned.
109. The American Revolution does not provide a
counterexample. The American "Revolution" was not a
revolution in our sense of the word, but a war of
independence followed by a rather far-reaching political
reform. The Founding Fathers did not change the
direction of development of American society, nor did
they aspire to do so. They only freed the development of
American society from the retarding effect of British
rule. Their political reform did not change any basic
trend, but only pushed American political culture along
its natural direction of development. British society, of
which American society was an offshoot, had been moving
for a long time in the direction of representative
democracy. And prior to the War of Independence the
Americans were already practicing a significant degree of
representative democracy in the colonial assemblies. The
political system established by the Constitution was
modeled on the British system and on the colonial
assemblies. With major alteration, to be sure -- there is
no doubt that the Founding Fathers took a very important
step. But it was a step along the road that
English-speaking world was already traveling. The proof
is that Britain and all of its colonies that were
populated predominantly by people of British descent
ended up with systems of representative democracy
essentially similar to that of the United States. If the
Founding Fathers had lost their nerve and declined to
sign the Declaration of Independence, our way of life
today would not have been significantly different. Maybe
we would have had somewhat closer ties to Britain, and
would have had a Parliament and Prime Minister instead of
a Congress and President. No big deal. Thus the American
Revolution provides not a counterexample to our
principles but a good illustration of them.
110. Still, one has to use common sense in applying the
principles. They are expressed in imprecise language that
allows latitude for interpretation, and exceptions to
them can be found. So we present these principles not as
inviolable laws but as rules of thumb, or guides to
thinking, that may provide a partial antidote to naive
ideas about the future of society. The principles should
be borne constantly in mind, and whenever one reaches a
conclusion that conflicts with them one should carefully
reexamine one's thinking and retain the conclusion only
if one has good, solid reasons for doing so.
111. The foregoing principles help to show how hopelessly
difficult it would be to reform the industrial system in
such a way as to prevent it from progressively narrowing
our sphere of freedom. There has been a consistent
tendency, going back at least to the Industrial
Revolution for technology to strengthen the system at a
high cost in individual freedom and local autonomy. Hence
any change designed to protect freedom from technology
would be contrary to a fundamental trend in the
development of our society. Consequently, such a change
either would be a transitory one -- soon swamped by the
tide of history -- or, if large enough to be permanent
would alter the nature of our whole society. This by the
first and second principles. Moreover, since society
would be altered in a way that could not be predicted in
advance (third principle) there would be great risk.
Changes large enough to make a lasting difference in
favor of freedom would not be initiated because it would
be realized that they would gravely disrupt the system.
So any attempts at reform would be too timid to be
effective. Even if changes large enough to make a lasting
difference were initiated, they would be retracted when
their disruptive effects became apparent. Thus, permanent
changes in favor of freedom could be brought about only
by persons prepared to accept radical, dangerous and
unpredictable alteration of the entire system. In other
words by revolutionaries, not reformers.
112. People anxious to rescue freedom without sacrificing
the supposed benefits of technology will suggest naive
schemes for some new form of society that would reconcile
freedom with technology. Apart from the fact that people
who make such suggestions seldom propose any practical
means by which the new form of society could be set up in
the first place, it follows from the fourth principle
that even if the new form of society could be once
established, it either would collapse or would give
results very different from those expected.
113. So even on very general grounds it seems highly
improbable that any way of changing society could be
found that would reconcile freedom with modern
technology. In the next few sections we will give more
specific reasons for concluding that freedom and
technological progress are incompatible.
114. As explained in paragraphs 65-67, 70-73, modern man
is strapped down by a network of rules and regulations,
and his fate depends on the actions of persons remote
from him whose decisions he cannot influence. This is not
accidental or a result of the arbitrariness of arrogant
bureaucrats. It is necessary and inevitable in any
technologically advanced society. The system HAS TO
regulate human behavior closely in order to function. At
work people have to do what they are told to do,
otherwise production would be thrown into chaos.
Bureaucracies HAVE TO be run according to rigid rules. To
allow any substantial personal discretion to lower-level
bureaucrats would disrupt the system and lead to charges
of unfairness due to differences in the way individual
bureaucrats exercised their discretion. It is true that
some restrictions on our freedom could be eliminated, but
GENERALLY SPEAKING the regulation of our lives by large
organizations is necessary for the functioning of
industrial-technological society. The result is a sense
of powerlessness on the part of the average person. It
may be, however, that formal regulations will tend
increasingly to be replaced by psychological tools that
make us want to do what the system requires of us.
(Propaganda [14], educational techniques, "mental health"
programs, etc.)
115. The system HAS TO force people to behave in ways
that are increasingly remote from the natural pattern of
human behavior. For example, the system needs scientists,
mathematicians and engineers. It can't function without
them. So heavy pressure is put on children to excel in
these fields. It isn't natural for an adolescent human
being to spend the bulk of his time sitting at a desk
absorbed in study. A normal adolescent wants to spend his
time in active contact with the real world. Among
primitive peoples the things that children are trained to
do tend to be in reasonable harmony with natural human
impulses. Among the American Indians, for example, boys
were trained in active outdoor pursuits -- just the sort
of thing that boys like. But in our society children are
pushed into studying technical subjects, which most do
grudgingly.
[[116 not used.]]
117. In any technologically advanced society the
individual's fate MUST depend on decisions that he
personally cannot influence to any great extent. A
technological society cannot be broken down into small,
autonomous communities, because production depends on the
cooperation of very large numbers of people. When a
decision affects, say, a million people, then each of the
affected individuals has, on the average, only a
one-millionth share in making the decision. What usually
happens in practice is that decisions are made by public
officials or corporation executives, or by technical
specialists, but even when the public votes on a decision
the number of voters ordinarily is too large for the vote
of any one individual to be significant. [17] Thus most
individuals are unable to influence measurably the major
decisions that affect their lives. There is no
conceivable way to remedy this in a technologically
advanced society. The system tries to "solve" this
problem by using propaganda to make people WANT the
decisions that have been made for them, but even if this
"solution" were completely successful in making people
feel better, it would be demeaning.
118. Conservatives and some others advocate more "local
autonomy." Local communities once did have autonomy, but
such autonomy becomes less and less possible as local
communities become more enmeshed with and dependent on
large-scale systems like public utilities, computer
networks, highway systems, the mass communications media,
the modern health care system. Also operating against
autonomy is the fact that technology applied in one
location often affects people at other locations far way.
Thus pesticide or chemical use near a creek may
contaminate the water supply hundreds of miles
downstream, and the greenhouse effect affects the whole
world.
119. The system does not and cannot exist to satisfy
human needs. Instead, it is human behavior that has to be
modified to fit the needs of the system. This has nothing
to do with the political or social ideology that may
pretend to guide the technological system. It is the
fault of technology, because the system is guided not by
ideology but by technical necessity. [18] Of course the
system does satisfy many human needs, but generally
speaking it does this only to the extent that it is to
the advantage of the system to do it. It is the needs of
the system that are paramount, not those of the human
being. For example, the system provides people with food
because the system couldn't function if everyone starved;
it attends to people's psychological needs whenever it
can CONVENIENTLY do so, because it couldn't function if
too many people became depressed or rebellious. But the
system, for good, solid, practical reasons, must exert
constant pressure on people to mold their behavior to the
needs of the system. To much waste accumulating? The
government, the media, the educational system,
environmentalists, everyone inundates us with a mass of
propaganda about recycling. Need more technical
personnel? A chorus of voices exhorts kids to study
science. No one stops to ask whether it is inhumane to
force adolescents to spend the bulk of their time
studying subjects most of them hate. When skilled workers
are put out of a job by technical advances and have to
undergo "retraining," no one asks whether it is
humiliating for them to be pushed around in this way. It
is simply taken for granted that everyone must bow to
technical necessity. and for good reason: If human needs
were put before technical necessity there would be
economic problems, unemployment, shortages or worse. The
concept of "mental health" in our society is defined
largely by the extent to which an individual behaves in
accord with the needs of the system and does so without
showing signs of stress.
120. Efforts to make room for a sense of purpose and for
autonomy within the system are no better than a joke. For
example, one company, instead of having each of its
employees assemble only one section of a catalogue, had
each assemble a whole catalogue, and this was supposed to
give them a sense of purpose and achievement. Some
companies have tried to give their employees more
autonomy in their work, but for practical reasons this
usually can be done only to a very limited extent, and in
any case employees are never given autonomy as to
ultimate goals -- their "autonomous" efforts can never be
directed toward goals that they select personally, but
only toward their employer's goals, such as the survival
and growth of the company. Any company would soon go out
of business if it permitted its employees to act
otherwise. Similarly, in any enterprise within a
socialist system, workers must direct their efforts
toward the goals of the enterprise, otherwise the
enterprise will not serve its purpose as part of the
system. Once again, for purely technical reasons it is
not possible for most individuals or small groups to have
much autonomy in industrial society. Even the
small-business owner commonly has only limited autonomy.
Apart from the necessity of government regulation, he is
restricted by the fact that he must fit into the economic
system and conform to its requirements. For instance,
when someone develops a new technology, the small-
business person often has to use that technology whether
he wants to or not, in order to remain competitive.
121. A further reason why industrial society cannot be
reformed in favor of freedom is that modern technology is
a unified system in which all parts are dependent on one
another. You can't get rid of the "bad" parts of
technology and retain only the "good" parts. Take modern
medicine, for example. Progress in medical science
depends on progress in chemistry, physics, biology,
computer science and other fields. Advanced medical
treatments require expensive, high-tech equipment that
can be made available only by a technologically
progressive, economically rich society. Clearly you can't
have much progress in medicine without the whole
technological system and everything that goes with it.
122. Even if medical progress could be maintained without
the rest of the technological system, it would by itself
bring certain evils. Suppose for example that a cure for
diabetes is discovered. People with a genetic tendency to
diabetes will then be able to survive and reproduce as
well as anyone else. Natural selection against genes for
diabetes will cease and such genes will spread throughout
the population. (This may be occurring to some extent
already, since diabetes, while not curable, can be
controlled through use of insulin.) The same thing will
happen with many other diseases susceptibility to which
is affected by genetic degradation of the population. The
only solution will be some sort of eugenics program or
extensive genetic engineering of human beings, so that
man in the future will no longer be a creation of nature,
or of chance, or of God (depending on your religious or
philosophical opinions), but a manufactured product.
123. If you think that big government interferes in your
life too much NOW, just wait till the government starts
regulating the genetic constitution of your children.
Such regulation will inevitably follow the introduction
of genetic engineering of human beings, because the
consequences of unregulated genetic engineering would be
disastrous. [19]
124. The usual response to such concerns is to talk about
"medical ethics." But a code of ethics would not serve to
protect freedom in the face of medical progress; it would
only make matters worse. A code of ethics applicable to
genetic engineering would be in effect a means of
regulating the genetic constitution of human beings.
Somebody (probably the upper-middle class, mostly) would
decide that such and such applications of genetic
engineering were "ethical". and others were not, so that
in effect they would be imposing their own values on the
genetic constitution of the population at large. Even if
a code of ethics were chosen on a completely democratic
basis, the majority would be imposing their own values on
any minorities who might have a different idea of what
constituted an "ethical" use of genetic engineering. The
only code of ethics that would truly protect freedom
would be one that prohibited ANY genetic engineering of
human beings, and you can be sure that no such code will
ever be applied in a technological society. No code that
reduced genetic engineering to a minor role could stand
up for long, because the temptation presented by the
immense power of biotechnology would be irresistible,
especially since to the majority of people many of its
applications will seem obviously and unequivocally good
(eliminating physical and mental diseases, giving people
the abilities they need to get along in today's world).
Inevitably, genetic engineering will be used extensively,
but only in ways consistent with the needs of the
industrial-technological system. [20]
125. It is not possible to make a LASTING compromise
between technology and freedom, because technology is by
far the more powerful social force and continually
encroaches on freedom through REPEATED compromises.
Imagine the case of two neighbors, each of whom at the
outset owns the same amount of land, but one of whom is
more powerful than the other. The powerful one demands a
piece of the other's land. The weak one refuses. The
powerful one says, "OK, let's compromise. Give me half of
what I asked." The weak one has little choice but to give
in. Some time later the powerful neighbor demands another
piece of land, again there is a compromise, and so forth.
By forcing a long series of compromises on the weaker
man, the powerful one eventually gets all of his land. So
it goes in the conflict between technology and freedom.
126. Let us explain why technology is a more powerful
social force than the aspiration for freedom.
127. A technological advance that appears not to threaten
freedom often turns out to threaten it very seriously
later on. For example, consider motorized transport. A
walking man formerly could go where he pleased, go at his
own pace without observing any traffic regulations, and
was independent of technological support-systems. When
motor vehicles were introduced they appeared to increase
man's freedom. They took no freedom away from the walking
man, no one had to have an automobile if he didn't want
one, and anyone who did choose to buy an automobile could
travel much faster and farther than a walking man. But
the introduction of motorized transport soon changed
society in such a way as to restrict greatly man's
freedom of locomotion. When automobiles became numerous,
it became necessary to regulate their use extensively. In
a car, especially in densely populated areas, one cannot
just go where one likes at one's own pace one's movement
is governed by the flow of traffic and by various traffic
laws. One is tied down by various obligations: license
requirements, driver test, renewing registration,
insurance, maintenance required for safety, monthly
payments on purchase price. Moreover, the use of
motorized transport is no longer optional. Since the
introduction of motorized transport the arrangement of
our cities has changed in such a way that the majority of
people no longer live within walking distance of their
place of employment, shopping areas and recreational
opportunities, so that they HAVE TO depend on the
automobile for transportation. Or else they must use
public transportation, in which case they have even less
control over their own movement than when driving a car.
Even the walker's freedom is now greatly restricted. In
the city he continually has to stop to wait for traffic
lights that are designed mainly to serve auto traffic. In
the country, motor traffic makes it dangerous and
unpleasant to walk along the highway. (Note this
important point that we have just illustrated with the
case of motorized transport: When a new item of
technology is introduced as an option that an individual
can accept or not as he chooses, it does not necessarily
REMAIN optional. In many cases the new technology changes
society in such a way that people eventually find
themselves FORCED to use it.)
128. While technological progress AS A WHOLE continually
narrows our sphere of freedom, each new technical advance
CONSIDERED BY ITSELF appears to be desirable.
Electricity, indoor plumbing, rapid long-distance
communications ... how could one argue against any of
these things, or against any other of the innumerable
technical advances that have made modern society? It
would have been absurd to resist the introduction of the
telephone, for example. It offered many advantages and no
disadvantages. Yet, as we explained in paragraphs 59-76,
all these technical advances taken together have created
a world in which the average man's fate is no longer in
his own hands or in the hands of his neighbors and
friends, but in those of politicians, corporation
executives and remote, anonymous technicians and
bureaucrats whom he as an individual has no power to
influence. [21] The same process will continue in the
future. Take genetic engineering, for example. Few people
will resist the introduction of a genetic technique that
eliminates a hereditary disease. It does no apparent harm
and prevents much suffering. Yet a large number of
genetic improvements taken together will make the human
being into an engineered product rather than a free
creation of chance (or of God, or whatever, depending on
your religious beliefs).
129. Another reason why technology is such a powerful
social force is that, within the context of a given
society, technological progress marches in only one
direction; it can never be reversed. Once a technical
innovation has been introduced, people usually become
dependent on it, so that they can never again do without
it, unless it is replaced by some still more advanced
innovation. Not only do people become dependent as
individuals on a new item of technology, but, even more,
the system as a whole becomes dependent on it. (Imagine
what would happen to the system today if computers, for
example, were eliminated.) Thus the system can move in
only one direction, toward greater technologization.
Technology repeatedly forces freedom to take a step back,
but technology can never take a step back -- short of the
overthrow of the whole technological system.
130. Technology advances with great rapidity and
threatens freedom at many different points at the same
time (crowding, rules and regulations, increasing
dependence of individuals on large organizations,
propaganda and other psychological techniques, genetic
engineering, invasion of privacy through surveillance
devices and computers, etc.). To hold back any ONE of the
threats to freedom would require a long and difficult
social struggle. Those who want to protect freedom are
overwhelmed by the sheer number of new attacks and the
rapidity with which they develop, hence they become
apathetic and no longer resist. To fight each of the
threats separately would be futile. Success can be hoped
for only by fighting the technological system as a whole;
but that is revolution, not reform.
131. Technicians (we use this term in its broad sense to
describe all those who perform a specialized task that
requires training) tend to be so involved in their work
(their surrogate activity) that when a conflict arises
between their technical work and freedom, they almost
always decide in favor of their technical work. This is
obvious in the case of scientists, but it also appears
elsewhere: Educators, humanitarian groups, conservation
organizations do not hesitate to use propaganda or other
psychological techniques to help them achieve their
laudable ends. Corporations and government agencies, when
they find it useful, do not hesitate to collect
information about individuals without regard to their
privacy. Law enforcement agencies are frequently
inconvenienced by the constitutional rights of suspects
and often of completely innocent persons, and they do
whatever they can do legally (or sometimes illegally) to
restrict or circumvent those rights. Most of these
educators, government officials and law officers believe
in freedom, privacy and constitutional rights, but when
these conflict with their work, they usually feel that
their work is more important.
132. It is well known that people generally work better
and more persistently when striving for a reward than
when attempting to avoid a punishment or negative
outcome. Scientists and other technicians are motivated
mainly by the rewards they get through their work. But
those who oppose technological invasions of freedom are
working to avoid a negative outcome, consequently there
are few who work persistently and well at this
discouraging task. If reformers ever achieved a signal
victory that seemed to set up a solid barrier against
further erosion of freedom through technical progress,
most would tend to relax and turn their attention to more
agreeable pursuits. But the scientists would remain busy
in their laboratories, and technology as it progresses
would find ways, in spite of any barriers, to exert more
and more control over individuals and make them always
more dependent on the system.
133. No social arrangements, whether laws, institutions,
customs or ethical codes, can provide permanent
protection against technology. History shows that all
social arrangements are transitory; they all change or
break down eventually. But technological advances are
permanent within the context of a given civilization.
Suppose for example that it were possible to arrive at
some social arrangements that would prevent genetic
engineering from being applied to human beings, or
prevent it from being applied in such a way as to
threaten freedom and dignity. Still, the technology would
remain waiting. Sooner or later the social arrangement
would break down. Probably sooner, given the pace of
change in our society. Then genetic engineering would
begin to invade our sphere of freedom. and this invasion
would be irreversible (short of a breakdown of
technological civilization itself). Any illusions about
achieving anything permanent through social arrangements
should be dispelled by what is currently happening with
environmental legislation. A few years ago its seemed
that there were secure legal barriers preventing at least
SOME of the worst forms of environmental degradation. A
change in the political wind, and those barriers begin to
crumble.
134. For all of the foregoing reasons, technology is a
more powerful social force than the aspiration for
freedom. But this statement requires an important
qualification. It appears that during the next several
decades the industrial-technological system will be
undergoing severe stresses due to economic and
environmental problems, and especially due to problems of
human behavior (alienation, rebellion, hostility, a
variety of social and psychological difficulties). We
hope that the stresses through which the system is likely
to pass will cause it to break down, or at least will
weaken it sufficiently so that a revolution against it
becomes possible. If such a revolution occurs and is
successful, then at that particular moment the aspiration
for freedom will have proved more powerful than
technology.
135. In paragraph 125 we used an analogy of a weak
neighbor who is left destitute by a strong neighbor who
takes all his land by forcing on him a series of
compromises. But suppose now that the strong neighbor
gets sick, so that he is unable to defend himself. The
weak neighbor can force the strong one to give him his
land back, or he can kill him. If he lets the strong man
survive and only forces him to give the land back, he is
a fool, because when the strong man gets well he will
again take all the land for himself. The only sensible
alternative for the weaker man is to kill the strong one
while he has the chance. In the same way, while the
industrial system is sick we must destroy it. If we
compromise with it and let it recover from its sickness,
it will eventually wipe out all of our freedom.
136. If anyone still imagines that it would be possible
to reform the system in such a way as to protect freedom
from technology, let him consider how clumsily and for
the most part unsuccessfully our society has dealt with
other social problems that are far more simple and
straightforward. Among other things, the system has
failed to stop environmental degradation, political
corruption, drug trafficking or domestic abuse.
137. Take our environmental problems, for example. Here
the conflict of values is straightforward: economic
expedience now versus saving some of our natural
resources for our grandchildren. [22] But on this subject
we get only a lot of blather and obfuscation from the
people who have power, and nothing like a clear,
consistent line of action, and we keep on piling up
environmental problems that our grandchildren will have
to live with. Attempts to resolve the environmental issue
consist of struggles and compromises between different
factions, some of which are ascendant at one moment,
others at another moment. The line of struggle changes
with the shifting currents of public opinion. This is not
a rational process, nor is it one that is likely to lead
to a timely and successful solution to the problem. Major
social problems, if they get "solved" at all, are rarely
or never solved through any rational, comprehensive plan.
They just work themselves out through a process in which
various competing groups pursuing their own (usually
short-term) self-interest [23] arrive (mainly by luck) at
some more or less stable modus vivendi. In fact, the
principles we formulated in paragraphs 100-106 make it
seem doubtful that rational long-term social planning can
EVER be successful.
138. Thus it is clear that the human race has at best a
very limited capacity for solving even relatively
straightforward social problems. How then is it going to
solve the far more difficult and subtle problem of
reconciling freedom with technology? Technology presents
clear-cut material advantages, whereas freedom is an
abstraction that means different things to different
people. and its loss is easily obscured by propaganda and
fancy talk.
139. And note this important difference: It is
conceivable that our environmental problems (for example)
may some day be settled through a rational, comprehensive
plan, but if this happens it will be only because it is
in the longterm interest of the system to solve these
problems. But it is NOT in the interest of the system to
preserve freedom or small-group autonomy. On the
contrary, it is in the interest of the system to bring
human behavior under control to the greatest possible
extent. [24] Thus, while practical considerations may
eventually force the system to take a rational, prudent
approach to environmental problems, equally practical
considerations will force the system to regulate human
behavior ever more closely (preferably by indirect means
that will disguise the encroachment on freedom). This
isn't just our opinion. Eminent social scientists (e.g.
James Q. Wilson) have stressed the importance of
"socializing" people more effectively.
140. We hope we have convinced the reader that the system
cannot be reformed in such a way as to reconcile freedom
with technology. The only way out is to dispense with the
industrial-technological system altogether. This implies
revolution, not necessarily an armed uprising, but
certainly a radical and fundamental change in the nature
of society.
141. People tend to assume that because a
revolution involves a much greater change than reform
does, it is more difficult to bring about than reform is.
Actually, under certain circumstances revolution is much
easier than reform. The reason is that a revolutionary
movement can inspire an intensity of commitment that a
reform movement cannot inspire. A reform movement merely
offers to solve a particular social problem. A
revolutionary movement offers to solve all problems at
one stroke and create a whole new world; it provides the
kind of ideal for which people will take great risks and
make great sacrifices. For this reasons it would be much
easier to overthrow the whole technological system than
to put effective, permanent restraints on the development
or application of any one segment of technology, such as
genetic engineering, for example. Not many people will
devote themselves with single-minded passion to imposing
and maintaining restraints on genetic engineering, but
under suitable conditions large numbers of people may
devote themselves passionately to a revolution against
the industrial-technological system. As we noted in
paragraph 132, reformers seeking to limit certain aspects
of technology would be working to avoid a negative
outcome. But revolutionaries work to gain a powerful
reward -- fulfillment of their revolutionary vision and
therefore work harder and more persistently than
reformers do.
142. Reform is always restrained by the fear of painful
consequences if changes go too far. But once a
revolutionary fever has taken hold of a society, people
are willing to undergo unlimited hardships for the sake
of their revolution. This was clearly shown in the French
and Russian Revolutions. It may be that in such cases
only a minority of the population is really committed to
the revolution, but this minority is sufficiently large
and active so that it becomes the dominant force in
society. We will have more to say about revolution in
paragraphs 180-205.
143. Since the beginning of civilization, organized
societies have had to put pressures on human beings for
the sake of the functioning of the social organism. The
kinds of pressures vary greatly from one society to
another. Some of the pressures are physical (poor diet,
excessive labor, environmental pollution), some are
psychological (noise, crowding, forcing human behavior
into the mold that society requires). In the past, human
nature has been approximately constant, or at any rate
has varied only within certain bounds. Consequently,
societies have been able to push people only up to
certain limits. When the limit of human endurance has
been passed, things start going wrong: rebellion, or
crime, or corruption, or evasion of work, or depression
and other mental problems, or an elevated death rate, or
a declining birth rate or something else, so that either
the society breaks down, or its functioning becomes too
inefficient and it is (quickly or gradually, through
conquest, attrition or evolution) replaced by some more
efficient form of society. [25]
144. Thus human nature has in the past put certain limits
on the development of societies. People could be pushed
only so far and no farther. But today this may be
changing, because modern technology is developing ways of
modifying human beings.
145. Imagine a society that subjects people to conditions
that make them terribly unhappy, then gives them drugs to
take away their unhappiness. Science fiction? It is
already happening to some extent in our own society. It
is well known that the rate of clinical depression has
been greatly increasing in recent decades. We believe
that this is due to disruption of the power process, as
explained in paragraphs 59-76. But even if we are wrong,
the increasing rate of depression is certainly the result
of SOME conditions that exist in today's society. Instead
of removing the conditions that make people depressed,
modern society gives them antidepressant drugs. In
effect, antidepressants are a means of modifying an
individual's internal state in such a way as to enable
him to tolerate social conditions that he would otherwise
find intolerable. (Yes, we know that depression is often
of purely genetic origin. We are referring here to those
cases in which environment plays the predominant role.)
146. Drugs that affect the mind are only one example of
the new methods of controlling human behavior that modern
society is developing. Let us look at some of the other
methods.
147. To start with, there are the techniques of
surveillance. Hidden video cameras are now used in most
stores and in many other places, computers are used to
collect and process vast amounts of information about
individuals. Information so obtained greatly increases
the effectiveness of physical coercion (i.e., law
enforcement). [26] Then there are the methods of
propaganda, for which the mass communication media
provide effective vehicles. Efficient techniques have
been developed for winning elections, selling products,
influencing public opinion. The entertainment industry
serves as an important psychological tool of the system,
possibly even when it is dishing out large amounts of sex
and violence. Entertainment provides modern man with an
essential means of escape. While absorbed in television,
videos, etc., he can forget stress, anxiety, frustration,
dissatisfaction. Many primitive peoples, when they don't
have work to do, are quite content to sit for hours at a
time doing nothing at all, because they are at peace with
themselves and their world. But most modern people must
be constantly occupied or entertained, otherwise they get
"bored," i.e., they get fidgety, uneasy, irritable.
148. Other techniques strike deeper than the foregoing.
Education is no longer a simple affair of paddling a
kid's behind when he doesn't know his lessons and patting
him on the head when he does know them. It is becoming a
scientific technique for controlling the child's
development. Sylvan Learning Centers, for example, have
had great success in motivating children to study, and
psychological techniques are also used with more or less
success in many conventional schools. "Parenting"
techniques that are taught to parents are designed to
make children accept fundamental values of the system and
behave in ways that the system finds desirable. "Mental
health" programs, "intervention" techniques,
psychotherapy and so forth are ostensibly designed to
benefit individuals, but in practice they usually serve
as methods for inducing individuals to think and behave
as the system requires. (There is no contradiction here;
an individual whose attitudes or behavior bring him into
conflict with the system is up against a force that is
too powerful for him to conquer or escape from, hence he
is likely to suffer from stress, frustration, defeat. His
path will be much easier if he thinks and behaves as the
system requires. In that sense the system is acting for
the benefit of the individual when it brainwashes him
into conformity.) Child abuse in its gross and obvious
forms is disapproved in most if not all cultures.
Tormenting a child for a trivial reason or no reason at
all is something that appalls almost everyone. But many
psychologists interpret the concept of abuse much more
broadly. Is spanking, when used as part of a rational and
consistent system of discipline, a form of abuse? The
question will ultimately be decided by whether or not
spanking tends to produce behavior that makes a person
fit in well with the existing system of society. In
practice, the word "abuse" tends to be interpreted to
include any method of child-rearing that produces
behavior inconvenient for the system. Thus, when they go
beyond the prevention of obvious, senseless cruelty,
programs for preventing "child abuse" are directed toward
the control of human behavior on behalf of the system.
149. Presumably, research will continue to increase the
effectiveness of psychological techniques for controlling
human behavior. But we think it is unlikely that
psychological techniques alone will be sufficient to
adjust human beings to the kind of society that
technology is creating. Biological methods probably will
have to be used. We have already mentioned the use of
drugs in this connection. Neurology may provide other
avenues for modifying the human mind. Genetic engineering
of human beings is already beginning to occur in the form
of "gene therapy," and there is no reason to assume that
such methods will not eventually be used to modify those
aspects of the body that affect mental functioning.
150. As we mentioned in paragraph 134, industrial society
seems likely to be entering a period of severe stress,
due in part to problems of human behavior and in part to
economic and environmental problems. And a considerable
proportion of the system's economic and environmental
problems result from the way human beings behave.
Alienation, low self-esteem, depression, hostility,
rebellion; children who won't study, youth gangs, illegal
drug use, rape, child abuse, other crimes, unsafe sex,
teen pregnancy, population growth, political corruption,
race hatred, ethnic rivalry, bitter ideological conflict
(e.g., pro-choice vs. pro-life), political extremism,
terrorism, sabotage, anti-government groups, hate groups.
All these threaten the very survival of the system. The
system will therefore be FORCED to use every practical
means of controlling human behavior.
151. The social disruption that we see today is certainly
not the result of mere chance. It can only be a result of
the conditions of life that the system imposes on people.
(We have argued that the most important of these
conditions is disruption of the power process.) If the
systems succeeds in imposing sufficient control over
human behavior to assure its own survival, a new
watershed in human history will have been passed. Whereas
formerly the limits of human endurance have imposed
limits on the development of societies (as we explained
in Paragraphs 143, 144), industrial-technological society
will be able to pass those limits by modifying human
beings, whether by psychological methods or biological
methods or both. In the future, social systems will not
be adjusted to suit the needs of human beings. Instead,
human being will be adjusted to suit the needs of the
system. [27]
152. Generally speaking, technological control over human
behavior will probably not be introduced with a
totalitarian intention or even through a conscious desire
to restrict human freedom. [28] Each new step in the
assertion of control over the human mind will be taken as
a rational response to a problem that faces society, such
as curing alcoholism, reducing the crime rate or inducing
young people to study science and engineering. In many
cases there will be a humanitarian justification. For
example, when a psychiatrist prescribes an
anti-depressant for a depressed patient, he is clearly
doing that individual a favor. It would be inhumane to
withhold the drug from someone who needs it. When Parents
send their children to Sylvan Learning Centers to have
them manipulated into becoming enthusiastic about their
studies, they do so from concern for their children's
welfare. It may be that some of these parents wish that
one didn't have to have specialized training to get a job
and that their kid didn't have to be brainwashed into
becoming a computer nerd. But what can they do? They
can't change society, and their child may be unemployable
if he doesn't have certain skills. So they send him to
Sylvan.
153. Thus control over human behavior will be introduced
not by a calculated decision of the authorities but
through a process of social evolution (RAPID evolution,
however). The process will be impossible to resist,
because each advance, considered by itself, will appear
to be beneficial, or at least the evil involved in making
the advance will appear to be beneficial, or at least the
evil involved in making the advance will seem to be less
than that which would result from not making it (see
paragraph 127). Propaganda for example is used for many
good purposes, such as discouraging child abuse or race
hatred. [14] Sex education is obviously useful, yet the
effect of sex education (to the extent that it is
successful) is to take the shaping of sexual attitudes
away from the family and put it into the hands of the
state as represented by the public school system.
154. Suppose a biological trait is discovered that
increases the likelihood that a child will grow up to be
a criminal, and suppose some sort of gene therapy can
remove this trait. [29] Of course most parents whose
children possess the trait will have them undergo the
therapy. It would be inhumane to do otherwise, since the
child would probably have a miserable life if he grew up
to be a criminal. But many or most primitive societies
have a low crime rate in comparison with that of our
society, even though they have neither high-tech methods
of child-rearing nor harsh systems of punishment. Since
there is no reason to suppose that more modern men than
primitive men have innate predatory tendencies, the high
crime rate of our society must be due to the pressures
that modern conditions put on people, to which many
cannot or will not adjust. Thus a treatment designed to
remove potential criminal tendencies is at least in part
a way of re-engineering people so that they suit the
requirements of the system.
155. Our society tends to regard as a "sickness" any mode
of thought or behavior that is inconvenient for the
system, and this is plausible because when an individual
doesn't fit into the system it causes pain to the
individual as well as problems for the system. Thus the
manipulation of an individual to adjust him to the system
is seen as a "cure" for a "sickness" and therefore as
good.
156. In paragraph 127 we pointed out that if the use of
a new item of technology is INITIALLY optional, it does
not necessarily REMAIN optional, because the new
technology tends to change society in such a way that it
becomes difficult or impossible for an individual to
function without using that technology. This applies also
to the technology of human behavior. In a world in which
most children are put through a program to make them
enthusiastic about studying, a parent will almost be
forced to put his kid through such a program, because if
he does not, then the kid will grow up to be,
comparatively speaking, an ignoramus and therefore
unemployable. Or suppose a biological treatment is
discovered that, without undesirable side-effects, will
greatly reduce the psychological stress from which so
many people suffer in our society. If large numbers of
people choose to undergo the treatment, then the general
level of stress in society will be reduced, so that it
will be possible for the system to increase the
stress-producing pressures. In fact, something like this
seems to have happened already with one of our society's
most important psychological tools for enabling people to
reduce (or at least temporarily escape from) stress,
namely, mass entertainment (see paragraph 147). Our use
of mass entertainment is "optional": No law requires us
to watch television, listen to the radio, read magazines.
Yet mass entertainment is a means of escape and
stress-reduction on which most of us have become
dependent. Everyone complains about the trashiness of
television, but almost everyone watches it. A few have
kicked the TV habit, but it would be a rare person who
could get along today without using ANY form of mass
entertainment. (Yet until quite recently in human history
most people got along very nicely with no other
entertainment than that which each local community
created for itself.) Without the entertainment industry
the system probably would not have been able to get away
with putting as much stress-producing pressure on us as it
does.
157. Assuming that industrial society survives, it is
likely that technology will eventually acquire something
approaching complete control over human behavior. It has
been established beyond any rational doubt that human
thought and behavior have a largely biological basis. As
experimenters have demonstrated, feelings such as hunger,
pleasure, anger and fear can be turned on and off by
electrical stimulation of appropriate parts of the brain.
Memories can be destroyed by damaging parts of the brain
or they can be brought to the surface by electrical
stimulation. Hallucinations can be induced or moods
changed by drugs. There may or may not be an immaterial
human soul, but if there is one it clearly is less
powerful that the biological mechanisms of human
behavior. For if that were not the case then researchers
would not be able so easily to manipulate human feelings
and behavior with drugs and electrical currents.
158. It presumably would be impractical for all people to
have electrodes inserted in their heads so that they
could be controlled by the authorities. But the fact that
human thoughts and feelings are so open to biological
intervention shows that the problem of controlling human
behavior is mainly a technical problem; a problem of
neurons, hormones and complex molecules; the kind of
problem that is accessible to scientific attack. Given
the outstanding record of our society in solving
technical problems, it is overwhelmingly probable that
great advances will be made in the control of human
behavior.
159. Will public resistance prevent the introduction of
technological control of human behavior? It certainly
would if an attempt were made to introduce such control
all at once. But since technological control will be
introduced through a long sequence of small advances,
there will be no rational and effective public
resistance. (See paragraphs 127, 132, 153.)
160. To those who think that all this sounds like science
fiction, we poiThe Nature of Freedom
Some Principles of History
Industrial-Technological Society Cannot Be Reformed
Restriction of Freedom Is Unavoidable in Industrial Society
The 'Bad' Parts of Technology Cannot Be Separated from
The 'Good' Parts
Technology Is a More Powerful Social Force Than the
Aspiration for Freedom
Simpler Social Problems Have Proved Intractable
Revolution Is Easier Than Reform
Control of Human Behavior