printTechno(Crato)Socialism:
a Critical Look at the Ideas of B. King and R. Petty
Davydov D.A.
Cand. Sci. (Polit.), Senior Research Fellow, Institute of Philosophy and Law, Ural Branch of RAS, Yekaterinburg, Russia davydovdmitriy90@gmail.com
Rubric: Discussion. Polemics
For citation:
Davydov D.A. Techno(Crato)Socialism: a Critical Look at the Ideas of B. King and R. Petty. Sotsiologicheskie issledovaniya [Sociological Studies]. 2023. No 9. P. 117-129
Abstract
The article deals with the concept of technosocialism by B. King and R. Petty. The author shows that this concept was a result of a synthesis of many intellectual trends of recent years: belief in technological progress and technologically driven abundance, discourses of automation and ideas of the advent of the era of artificial intelligence dominance, as well as various concepts of post-capitalism, based on the ideas of post-labor society, the “capitalist road to communism”, unconditional basic income, etc. According to King and Petty, socialism can be achieved not through political revolutions or radical socio-political transformations, but with the help of the latest technologies, robots and artificial intelligence. All that needs to be done is to redirect the flow of “gifts of automation” from the exceptionally wealthy to everyone else through a series of cosmetic changes, such as taxation of robots and unconditional basic income. The article reveals the vulnerable sides of King and Petty position. The author shows that their concept represents a technocratic class position, their views on the coming technologically driven abundance are naive and based on shaky empirical grounds. The technosocialism of King and Petty turns out to be techno(crato)socialism when viewed closely, since their version of post-capitalist society is characterized not so much by the true realization of the personal potential of everyone, but by radical social stratification. It is also characterized by degraded and unskilled labor, “optimization” of such important areas of activity as education and medicine, as well as the redirection of material resources from the field of social policy to the field of consumption (basic income).
Keywords
technosocialism; post-capitalism; socialism; communism; technocracy; basic income; Marxism; post-Marxism; automation; robotization
References
Barbrook R., Cameron A. (1996) The Californian Ideology. Science as Culture. No. 1: 44–72.
Bastani A. (2019) Fully Automated Luxury Communism. New York: Verso.
Broockman D.E., Ferenstein G., Malhotra N. (2019) Predispositions and the Political Behavior of American Economic Elites: Evidence from Technology Entrepreneurs. American Journal of Political Science. No. 1: 212–233.
Brynjolfsson E., McAfee A. (2017) The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies. Moscow: AST. (In Russ.)
Danaher J. (2019) Automation and Utopia: Human Flourishing in a World without Work. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Fishman L.G. (2022) Capitalism is Ending, but “Prehistory” is Not? Mirovaia ekonomika i mezhdunarodnye otnosheniia [World Eсonomy and International Relations]. No. 10: 112–122. (In Russ.)
Ford M. (2016) Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future. Moscow: Alpina nonfiction. (In Russ.)
Frase P. (2016) Four Futures: Life After Capitalism. New York: Verso.
Gray M.L., Suri S. (2019) Ghost Work: How to Stop Silicon Valley from Building a New Global Underclass.New York: Mariner Books.
Jones P. (2021) Work Without the Worker: Labour in the Age of Platform Capitalism. New York: Verso.
Kapeliushnikov R.I. (2017) Is Technological Change a Devourer of Jobs? Voprosy Ekonomiki [Questions of Economic]. No. 11: 111–140. (In Russ.)
Kapeliushnikov R.I. (2020) Universal Basic Income: Does It Have a Future? Moscow: VSHE. (In Russ.)
King B., Petty R. (2022) The Rise of Technosocialism: How Inequality, AI and Climate will Usher in a New World. Moscow: Olimp-Press. (In Russ.)
Kotkin J. (2020) The Coming of Neo-Feudalism: A Warning to the Global Middle Class. New York, Encounter Books.
Kotler S., Diamandis P. (2018) Abundance: The Future Is Better Than You Think. Moscow: AST Publ. (In Russ.)
Mart’ianov V.S., Fishman L.G., Davydov D.A. (2019) Rental society: In the Shadow of Labor, Capital and Democracy. Moscow: VSHE. (In Russ.)
Mason P. (2016) Postcapitalism: A Guide to Our Future. Moscow: Ad Marginem. (In Russ.)
Munn L. (2022) Automation Is a Myth. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
van Parijs P., Vanderborght Y. (2020) Basic Income: A Radical Proposal for a Free Society and a Sane Economy. Moscow: VSHE. (In Russ.)
Pasquale F. (2022) New Laws of Robotics: Defending Human Expertise in the Age of AI. Moscow: DELO. (In Russ.)
Pinker S. (2021) Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress. Moscow: Alpina non-fiction. (In Russ.)
Resnikoff J. (2022) Labor’s End: How the Promise of Automation Degraded Work. Champaign: University of Illinois Press.
Ridley M. (2015) The Rational Optimist. How Prosperity Evolves. Moscow: Eksmo. (In Russ.)
Smil V. (2022) How the World Really Works: The Science Behind How We Got Here and Where We’re Going. New York: Viking.
Srnicek N., Williams A. (2019) Inventing the Future: Postcapitalism and a World Without Work. Moscow: Strelka Press. (In Russ.)
Storr W. (2019) Selfie. How we Became So Self-Obsessed and What It’s Doing to Us. Moscow: Individuum. (In Russ.)
Susskind D. (2020) A World Without Work: Technology, Automation, and How We Should Respond. Moscow: Individuum. (In Russ.)
Wright J.A. (2023) Robots Won’t Save Japan: An Ethnography of Eldercare Automation. Ithaca: Cornell University Press (ILR Press).
Content No 9, 2023