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Internet as a democratic medium by E. Prugovecki 15 July 2002 20:54 UTC |
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I found it intriguing to read today, under the subject "Noreena Hertz on Globalization," the transcript of the interview of Noreena Hertz by Bill Moyers, since only a week ago I referred to that interview in the article "Utopianism and terranism" that appeared on July 8, 2002 on the H-Utopia discussion network http://www2.h-net.msu.edu/~utopia/ I used the crucial role that Internet played in spreading around the news about the events in Bolivia (while all the other media ignored it) as an example of the future role that the Internet and its future more sophisticated versions might play during the possible emergence of a new "world system," which I call "terranism." Such discussion groups as WSN might want to take note of these ideas as guidelines towards not only discussing issues, but for eventually arriving at some constructive decision via a mechanism which I call "coordinated group decision making" - cf. the web site www.wfs.org/prugovecki.htm I shall reproduce below the most pertinent parts of the aforementioned article, whose fuller version is due to appear on the Utopias Forum web site http://www.wfs.org/utopias.htm under the title ON SOME FUTURE SOCIAL EFFECTS OF THE COMMUNICATIONS REVOLUTION. For all those who view utopias simply as self-indulgent fantasies, let me hasten to add that, as a scientist, I view them instead as the type of sociological model building that is an essential part to the contemporary process of scientific investigation and discovery: models might not survive, or might have to be drastically modified when confronted with reality, but without posing them first, and then investigating them, scientific research would be a purely hit-and-miss enterprise. TERRANISM AS A MODEL FOR A WORLD SYSTEM The idea of "terranism" as a model for a future "world system" was presented in the context of a futuristic society, called Terra, described in my two recently published books: "Memoirs of the Future" (Cross Cultural Publications, Notre Dame, 2001) and "Dawn of the New Man" (Xlibris, Philadelphia, 2002) - cf. www.xlibris.com/dawnofthenewman.html Terranism is rooted in a totally horizontal organization of society, which is achieved in Terra by means of a computer-assisted form of "coordinated group decision making" - for which the acronym "cogdem" will be used. In Terra any individual has the basic right to come forward with innovative ideas that initiate cogdem protocols. Any such proposal is then deliberated via a Coordinating Computer Complex, or CCC, according to cogdem rules devised by Terran mathematical sociologists, meant to eliminate redundancy and enhance decision-making efficiency. Once a mini-max point in the debate is reached, beyond which further discussion would become wasteful and counter-productive, the appropriate programs of CCC automatically submit the final choice between the proposed alternatives to a voting procedure involving all those concerned. The voting can be carried out virtually instantaneously by each individual concerned due to the advanced computer technology available to every Terran in his or her home and workplace. Thus, by directly participating in all important decisions that affect their own lives, Terrans have a personal stake in the welfare of all their communities - from local neighborhoods to the global level involving all of Terra. By advocating participatory democracy, social and economic equality, as well as the maximum amount of freedom compatible with civilized behavior, terranism radically departs from the two main social ideologies of the twentieth century, namely capitalism and communism. But how realistic is it to expect that some of its features will be realized in the future? The emergence of the Internet and of e-mail is the first step towards CCC, and has made the ideas about a Terran way of life based on cogdem realistic at the technological level. Indeed, although the Internet-email combination has not yet reached the level of sophistication of CCC, it does possess some of its key features: 1) it has become widely available in advanced countries; 2) as opposed to newspapers and TV, it enables two-way communication; 3) also as opposed to newspapers and TV, it is not controlled by the wealthy owners of communication empires. In other words, present-day Internet is an intrinsically democratic medium, to which anybody can have access for a modest fee, and which can be used by anybody to disseminate information, rather than be simply a passive recipient of news programs reflecting the establishment point of view. Hundreds of discussion groups, including H-Utopia, already exist and operate via the Internet, exchanging information about various topics of common interest. However, sociologically speaking, what is still lacking as a first step towards cogdem is a deeper sense of involvement, which would make some of these groups arrive at group decisions about matters of common concern. What might prompt such a social initiative? The answer is: a Communications Revolution, in which the computer plays the role that the steam engine did in the Industrial Revolution. In countries with a higher level of general education, one can hope that due to an increased variety of political points of view presented on the Internet many of the "common" people will achieve a higher level of enlightened self-interest, and in so doing will finally glimpse the truth behind the web of disinformation fed to them by mainstream media controlled by those in power. They might then decide by means of rudimentary cogdem procedures to take into their own hands matters which are of immediate concern to them all - not necessarily out of altruism, but in order to protect their own personal interests. This might happen at first at a local community level: in municipalities, in townships, in various companies. In such small-scale social and business institutions people could use ordinary e-mail (and later on audio-visual e-mail, as it gets developed), to communicate with one another about matters of common concern, to exchange opinions about possible courses of action, and eventually to democratically pass amongst themselves resolutions about courses of action to be adopted by their entire discussion group. As this idea spreads and experts get involved, various software programs might be developed to facilitate this cogdem process and remove redundancy. Fifth generation computers, which display "artificial intelligence" (as the CCC in Terra does), might further streamline various cogdem protocols. Mathematical sociologists might make significant contributions to these protocols, so that they would allow each participant to express his or her point of view without that giving rise to endless debates resulting in virtual filibusters. Of course, such an evolutionary process would not happen overnight, but over decades. New educational methods, such as those discussed in "Memoirs of the Future" and "Dawn of the New Man," might be gradually introduced to facilitate and enhance the kind of social harmony, in a truly democratic society, which consists of alert individuals who are not prone to falling for misleading political catchwords and false pledges. The fundamental thesis behind these projections into the future is that the existence of Internet in its present generally accessible form makes possible the emergence of a more sophisticated and better informed electorate, which might ultimately search for cogdem forms for the political expression of their common will, and that if this does happen, the basic motive will not be utopian altruism (which, at the present stage of development of the human race, is an extremely rare commodity!), but enlightened self-interest based on information distributed via the Internet. An interesting case of this nature was reported very recently (July 6, 2002) by the PBS program NOW, hosted by Bill Moyers. It dealt with the unprincipled exploitation by US companies of the water rights of common people in Bolivia, and emphasized the fact that this story was totally ignored by all the US news media, but that it was nevertheless eventually spread around the world by means of Internet. It thus opened the eyes of many in Europe and elsewhere (and hopefully also in US, after the story was finally picked up by PBS!) about corporate abuses of this nature, and how some courageous but otherwise ordinary people coped with them. There are at present communication experts who have researched the ways in which the mainstream media interpret political reality, and have revealed in their writings how TV shows and broadcasts are subtly - and sometimes not so subtly - doctored so as to serve special interests. Internet, however, is still an exception - although by now there already are those who advocate a "Control Web" (cf. the May-June issue of The Futurist) which is capable of removing even that freedom of uncensored interpersonal and public communication. According to the basic premises of terranism, each Terran has equal access to CCC, and can disseminate his or her own version of any newsworthy event, which then receives the same exposure as everybody else's. This is taken to be a basic democratic right of each Terran. Of course, a very sophisticated CCC distribution system is required to automatically and impartially classify and distribute on the global level news gathered in this manner. Since the Internet does not yet possess these features, the freedom of expression it affords applies only within the context of relatively small discussion groups - such as H-Utopia or WSN; whereas, on a larger scale the scene is already dominated by Internet media with great commercial power. Nevertheless, even the present freedom of the Internet as a communication medium is certainly better than the situation a scant decade ago, when these opportunities for public expressions of one's point of view simply did not exist. Ahead of the next generation there obviously lies a struggle between those who want to control and manipulate the Internet and its successors for their own private interests - as has been the case in the past with many other inventions that are the common heritage of mankind - and those who want every human being to have equal access to such a powerful medium of communication, and ultimately an advanced technological tool for exercising one's rights in grass root forms of participatory democracy.
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