Across the globe, autocratic governments are beholden to archaic militaries, corporations and ideologies. These interests may jostle for scraps of power and put on a show for the masses, but the outcome is preordained: the powerful become more influential and the People remain enslaved. Only the most deluded of observers could conclude that agents of [insert country name]‘s government represent the interests of the People. There are simply too many historical examples of corruption, graft and subversion to think governments have a higher priority than self-interest. And if that be the case, then governments are taxing the People without representing the people. In the mid-1700s some rowdy colonialists thought this was unacceptable and were willing to fight a war to “liberate” themselves, but for the most part society today accepts taxation as their “civic duty” – irregardless of whose interests the government serves. Obviously, this represents a great tragedy for the People of the world, but it’s important to remember that the flip-side is also true: If you are aligned with or in the pocket of vested interests, this confluence of wage slavery and complacency indicates the application of successful economic policy. So long as this classist hegemony remains unchallenged, the People will remain enslaved and corruption will rule.
On the other hand, technological innovations have the potential to destabilize the status quo by empowering the masses with the means necessary for authentic political engagement. Over the last decade various “colour revolutions” have captured the attention – and imagination! – of the world, and riding centre-stage in each of these uprisings has been the gratuitous use of Internet web 2.0 technologies. This was especially publicized during Iran’s election protests, when Twitter was used to coordinate activists’ efforts and explicitly supported by the US State Department; but it was also a significant factor in recent G20 protests in the UK and Pittsburgh.
Drawing on a growing realization of the potency in technologically-mediated active citizenship, Ivo Gormley’s recent documentary, “Us Now“, bears witness to the birth of “Government 2.0″ and argues “trust can be enhanced by the human interconnectivity allowed by the net.” In this 60 minute tour de force, various media-savvy pundits describe how ‘common citizens’ are using web 2.0 technologies for social networking, mass collaboration and mass innovation; but at the heart of the documentary lies a provocative challenge to entrenched, reactionary governments: the Internet undercuts traditional hierarchies and facilitates democracy more thoroughly, cheaply, and honestly than you can.
Here’s the trailer:
“In his student flat in Colchester, Jack Howe is staring intently into his computer screen. He is picking the team for Ebbsfleet United’s FA Trophy Semi-Final match against Aldershot. Around the world 35,000 other fans are doing the same thing, because together, they own and manage the football club. If distributed networks of people can run complex organisations such as football clubs, what else can they do?
Us Now takes a look at how this type of participation could transform the way that countries are governed. It tells the stories of the online networks whose radical self-organising structures threaten to change the fabric of government forever.
Us Now follows the fate of Ebbsfleet United, a football club owned and run by its fans; Zopa, a bank in which everyone is the manager; and Couch Surfing, a vast online network whose members share their homes with strangers.
The founding principles of these projects — transparency, self-selection, open participation — are coming closer and closer to the mainstream of our social and political lives. Us Now describes this transition and confronts politicians George Osborne and Ed Milliband with the possibilities for participative government as described by Don Tapscott and Clay Shirky amongst others.” (Us Now: About)
If you’d like to see more, you can watch the full documentary online, here. Otherwise, you can download it via bittorrent here or buy the DVD here.
Although the documentary is rather UK-centric and wears rose-tinted glasses throughout, it persuasively argues that mass collaboration is more effective and efficient than traditional, top-down decision making. This will come as no surprise to students of general semantics or fans of Robert Anton Wilson, who repeatedly admonished readers to remember that ‘communication only occurs among equals’. According to Wilson et al, social and ideologic power differentials prevent or warp honest discourse. We see this principle in action every time an employee is afraid of being themselves around their employer, a child lies to a parent about why they were late, or when a boss is afraid of being seen by employees as anything other than the boss. In contrast, “Us Now” suggests that when people feel included in transparent decision making processes, solutions tend to be more creative, plans are prone to be more robust and inclusive, and the potential for “catastrophic failures” is lessened.
“Many exciting new web innovations are adapted from the creations of coders and activists devising ways to allow better access of information in the public domain, to be used towards campaigning for change outside of the official systems created by hierarchical power structures. This often starts by building or adapting an online arena where knowledge can be logged and accessed in a collaborative way. A simple example is a forum, or a place to report problems in your borough, which must then be publicly seen to be investigated.
This is a Foucaldian take on the world [power-knowledge-discourse] that appeals to liberals who want to embrace the future and the untold possibilities of connecting with individuals of the world at large.” (Channel 4)
No matter how many people are involved in the decision making process, without access to reliable information any decisions made are unlikely to be successful. Recognizing that “a lot of information” ≠ “a lot of good information”, “Us Now” emphasizes the relevance of ‘communal content policing’. Digital communities, according to the documentary’s bias, arise and flourish because people feel invested and share freely. As a result, who you ‘are’ is becoming less an issue of what you ‘have’ and more an issue of what you ‘share’. Given that I have long seen knowledge hoarded as wisdom lost, this resonated very strongly with me. Over the years I have engaged many strategies while acting as an information broker, but none of this effort got me a better job, bought me dinner, or triggered the eschaton. According to “Us Now” people like me do things like that because we’re interested in “reputational capital”. By sharing information, mass collaborators earn social capital from within their chosen communities, and this helps to self-police the validity of content. One of the examples used in “Us Now” is Mumsnet.com, an online community “by parents, for parents” in which parents share strategies, fears and frustrations with other parents. Anyone who registers can have a voice at Mumsnet, but “reputational capital” helps buffer the community from deviant suggestions. However, this can also facilitate cliquishness and egregious examples of groupthink, but “Us Now” argues that these are challenges of implementation, not appropriateness.
In spite of its impressive defense of Internet-mediated collaboration, “Us Now” generally avoids the darker underbelly of mass participation. Decades ago Robert Heinlein said the “greatest fallacy of democracy is that everyone’s opinion is worth the same”, and I hazard to guess things haven’t changed much since. Critical thinking is a difficult skill to strengthen under the best of circumstances, but society’s addiction to TV and the celebrity culture popularizes ignorance and entrenches uncritical consumption. Meanwhile, on the Internet the lines are blurred between outright quackery, knowledgeable ‘amateurs’, and special-interest-beholden ‘experts’. Differentiating between them may benefit from “reputational capital”, but it’s still caveat emptor. Moreover, with a little money and a bit of subterfuge it’s relatively easy to monopolize or subvert online discussions. Finally, “Us Now” is completely silent about ongoing efforts to censor and restrict access to the Internet, American domination of the Internet’s infrastructure, government-sponsored disinformation campaigns, and the active suppression of technologies that threaten established hierarchies. Nonetheless, “Us Now” presents a captivating image of what’s possible, and that’s where it’s greatest value lies. If you’ve got an interest in information ecology, the convergence of technological innovation and social systems, or digitally-mediated libertarianism, “Us Now” is one you might want to check out.
Additional Rabbit Holes -
Tags: activism, agitprop, classism, conflict, creativity, diatribes, documentary, fascism, grass roots, hegemony, information, innovation, internet, internet neutrality, philosophy, polemic, politics, progress, propaganda, psychology, revolution, Strategies for Revolutionaries, technology, web 2.0, youtube
