Everything about Technocracy Incorporated totally explained
Technocracy Incorporated is a North American organization formed in the 1930s after the dissolution of the
Technical Alliance.
Howard Scott became the founder and leader of the new organization which sought to implement the findings of the Alliance and create a new kind of society.
The group was incorporated in the state of
New York in 1933 as a
non-profit, non-political, non-
sectarian organization. Led by Scott, then director-in-chief or "Chief Engineer", the organization promoted its goals of educating people about the Alliance's ideas via a North American
lecture tour in 1934, gaining support throughout the
depression years.
The precedent document of the Technocracy movement is the
Technocracy Study Course first published in 1934. The Technocracy Study Course includes the Technate design in its last two chapters. The information before that's a general introduction to science and how that could relate to a scientific social design. Howard Scott noted that the science behind the ideas of Technocracy Technate design are based on the work of an American scientist
Willard Gibbs (note in links below the article by Technocracy Incorporated called
History and Purpose of Technocracy by Scott).
One of many notable members of Technocracy Incorporated was
M. King Hubbert, a
geophysicist who proposed the theory which has become known as the
Hubbert Peak or
Peak oil.
Organization
The standard unit for the organization is the chartered Section, consisting of at least fifty members. At Technocracy's height in popularity, many cities contained more than one Section, sometimes as many as a dozen or more. These sections undertook the majority of Technocracy's work, including the research that continued after the Technical Alliance.
The organization receives its funds entirely from dues and donations from its members. Because of the goal of abolishing political controls, membership is open to any citizen of North America, except
politicians.
Technocracy's Continental Headquarters ("CHQ") was originally situated in
New York. It has moved several times through its history, and is currently located in
Ferndale, Washington.
Ideas and goals
Technocracy Incorporated aims to establish a
zero growth socio-economic system based upon
conservation and
abundance as opposed to
scarcity-based economic systems like
capitalism or the so called planned economic system (within a
Price System) used by
Communist states.
A core conclusion reached by Technocracy Incorporated is that a price system, or any system based on scarcity, is an illogical means of distribution in our technologically advanced world. The Technate design concept as explained by Technocracy Incorporated sees established economic, political, and administrative forms as relics of a traditional past.
The organisation argues that developments in
mechanization have caused a massive shift of employment towards the
service sector. Further increases in efficiency and productivity mean that most of the tasks performed by human employees could be reduced or eliminated through better
management,
automation, and
centralization. These trends should signal an increase in both production possibilities and
leisure time since more can be produced with less human labor. Within a market system, however, increased productivity often leads to
downsizing because companies need fewer workers and lower wages because of competition. Consequently, the
standard of living falls for many. Thus, Technocrats argue that we're faced with a fundamental paradox: As inexpensive machines become available to replace human labor, they don't make our lives easier; on the contrary, they make them harder. The more people are capable of producing due to technology, the greater the
disparities in wealth will become and the potential benefit of technology will be shared less. The basic cause of this problem, in the view of Technocracy Incorporated, is the fact that we rely on a
money-based system to make economic decisions.
As opposed to economists, who define
efficiency in terms of maximal
allocation of limited
resources, in order to provide the most utility to their owners, Technocrats define efficiency in terms of
empirical evidence. Efficiency, for a Technocrat, is measured scientifically: a ratio of energy applied for useful work to energy applied in the complete system. Technocrats argue there exists a massive rift between the real world of science and the world of economics. They claim the inputs needed to make most products are in abundance, especially those critical to society's needs like food, shelter, transportation, information, etc. Technocrats argue that most social ills, such as
poverty and
hunger are due to faulty economics and improper use of technology. They frequently point out that the current price system is wasteful as it utilizes as many resources as possible but can only create scarce products (excludable and rival
private goods). Technocrats argue that full use of our technology and resources should be able to produce an abundance.
Technocrats claim that the price system entails a severe lack of
purchasing power, and has been propped up by wasteful tactics, major patches to the economic system, and increasingly huge amounts of debt, which began to increase exponentially after
1930. This debt includes the U.S.
national debt,
mortgages (see
global debt), long term debt,
credit debt, and the growing
stock market. Technocrats see growing debt as a threat to the stability of capitalism. Technocrats claim that the price system will eventually fail, in which case the movement hopes to have educated enough of the populace in order to peaceably make changes to the economic structure and create a
Technate.
An alternative to money: Energy accounting
Energy Accounting is a hypothetical system of distribution, which would record the
Energy used to produce and distribute goods and services consumed by citizens in a Technate. The units of this accounting system would be known as
Energy Certificates, or simply
Energy Units, these would replace
money in a Technate, but unlike traditional money or
currencies, energy certificates couldn't be saved or earned, only distributed evenly among a populace.
The amount of units given to each citizen would be calculated by determining the total productive capacity of the technate and dividing it equally after infrastructure requirements were met. The Energy units or certificates themselves would probably not have to be physically used by the populace as the system would be computerised. In energy accounting the Technate would use information of natural resources, industrial capacity and citizen’s purchasing habits to determine how much of any good or service was being consumed by the populace, so that it could match
production with
consumption within a sustainable resource base.
Some reasons given for the use of Energy Accounting are, to ensure the highest possible standard of living, as well as
equality, among the Technate’s citizenry, as well as prohibit expending resources that go beyond the productive or ecological capacity of the technate. Technocrats point out that energy accounting isn't
rationing; it's a way to distribute an
abundance and track
demand. Everyone would receive an equal, abundant (for example far more than they need), amount of consuming power via this method in theory. Technocrats predict that at today's rates of
energy conversion, no person will rationally be able to use up all their energy units.
The North American Technate
The
North American Technate is a design and plan to transform North America into a Technocratic society. The plan includes using
Canada's rich deposits of
minerals and
hydro-electric power as a complement to the United States's
industrial and
agricultural capacity (Many of the details of this plan are presented in the Technocracy Study Course).
The North America Technate would be composed of all of
North America,
Central America, the
Caribbean, parts of
South America and
Greenland, encompassing some 30 modern nations (as well as numerous
Non-Self-Governing Territories). If the Technate were set up today, it would contain nearly 600 million citizens and its total
land area would be over 26 million square km (making it the
largest nation on Earth).
Its territorial claims would stretch from the
North Pole in the north, to the
Equator in the south and from the Caribbean in the west, to the
International Date Line in the
Pacific Ocean, to the east.
Urbanates: A technocratic replacement for cities
Once a technate has been established Technocracy Incorporated advocates an entirely new form of living environment called
Urbanates. An Urbanate is essentially an assembly of buildings where people live and work. These places would have all the facilities needed for a community, including schools, hospitals, shopping malls,
waste management and
recycling facilities, sports centres, and public areas.
Technocrats plan for Urbanates to be something akin to resorts, designed to give each citizen the highest standard of living possible. Getting around in an Urbanate would be inherently easy and efficient. Every kind of major facility would be placed within walking distance of a housing complex, eliminating the need for cars.
Urbanates would be connected via a continent-wide transportation network envisioned by Technocracy, which would involve a
High-speed rail network linking every Urbanate, the
Continental Hydrology (a massive
Canal network), and
air transport. These systems would also be connected to the Technate's
industrial sites for easy transport of goods to consumers, and to all recreational and vacation areas of the continent.
The reason given by Technate advocates for all this ambitious restructuring of urban life is that modern
cities are often extremely
poorly planned and built in a haphazard way leading to major inefficiencies,
waste, and large numbers of
social and environmental problems. Technocrats believe that rather than trying to solve all these problems within the framework of existing cities, it's best to start with a clean slate and construct Urbanates when needed.
Technocracy Incorporated Publications
The organization has published several magazines throughout its history, including the
The Technocrat,
The Northwest Technocrat and
Technocracy Digest, it currently publishes the
North American Technocrat and the movement still continues after more than 70 years of history (for a more complete list of past publications see here
(External Link
)).
- Technocracy Study Course [Technocracy,Inc.] (1934)
- Technocracy Handbook [Technocracy,Inc.], (1939)
- The Sellout of the Ages, Howard Scott, (1941)
- Our Country, Right or Wrong, (1946)
- Continentalism: The Mandate of Survival, (1947)
Further Information
Get more info on 'Technocracy Incorporated'.
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