Timely post as I am slogging through Power and Progress by Acemoglu and Johnson right now. They are arguing for a technocratic statist approach to AI and technology more broadly. Was hoping it would challenge my thinking a bit, but so far it is extremely underwhelming.
Good luck with that! I've been disappointed in how technocratic the AJR approach to current policies has been. Their Atlantic slave trade work, and the AR Why Nations Failed, were not so technocratic, but since they they have certainly leaned in to the idea that expert decision making can replace messy decentralized processes and yield better outcomes. I remain unpersuaded.
Lynne, i like the three rules be because i have collided with them many times in the british civil service. And where the hegemonic assumption is always to centralise for reasons of consistency. So Prostel’s ideas make some sense to me because i can relate them to my experience and what i see happening in my own country. That does not make me a fully signed up Hayekian, although his ideas are valuable along side others.
My issue with Postrel is whether she sees the lead up to the financial crash as a full vindication of the value of her ideas or would she modify them in the face of this experience. Hayek may well have left the financial system crash to avoid stasis. Bernanke did what he did…. As The expert. Whether we are in a better place i am not so sure, but i am less of an expert!
Keep writing as i always look out for your different take on society, Lawrence
Thank you Lawrence! From a Hayekian perspective the financial crisis was a consequence of, among other things, epistemic hubris, the conceit that government policy makers can guide such a complex system as an economy of 300 million people (let alone a global one of 6 billion, or however many we are now). Epistemic hubris is the signature conceit of technocracy.
Completely new to this arena - but after reading the article I had some queries, to see if they were talked about at this conference.
One on the permissions - to me it sounds like a full push to deregulation of markets and industries, is that the gist? If so I'm curious on whether there were discussions on market failures? Up to this point I'd thought fully unregulated markets had a tendency to create large wealth disparities, and, as they are unregulated, generally don't internalise environmental costs - leading to the kind of state of the world we're in today.
I'm fully on board with some deregulation, I'm an engineer, and have seen in my industry how red tape (usually well intentioned) can lead to delays in progress (often delaying the very types of technology the government is trying to support that catalysed the new regulation).
So I suppose my question is - how does a free market/deregulated/permission equality economy go about ensuring externalities are involved in costs?
Do we need these externalities or is there the aspect of "she'll be right" (an Aussie addage) as there would be a natural solution to these issues from innovations that are developed to fight them?
On that note, where does the line get drawn on regulation? Assumedly we don't want to get rid of all regulation, otherwise we could no longer rely on contracts to be fulfilled, banks to act in common interests, stock brokers not to lie, etc. Etc. So do we limit regulation to contracts? Should they be self imposed regulations designed to protect innovators, written by innovators [lawyers]? What does regulation look like in an unregulated system?
David Graeber in his book "The First 5000 Years of Debt", makes a convincing point that governments and regulation actually create and form new markets, which then multiplies areas of interest and diversity of thought. I'd love to hear an exchange between him and some of the speakers at the conference, I think it would be fascinating.
I've got so many questions, would love to hear whatever thoughts are out there.
Graeber's point about planned markets cuts two ways. In one sense it's an argument for decentralized coordination and using the price system as the nervous system it is and should be. But in another sense it's still grounded in an economic hubris that governments can identify a need, define a product, define a robust market design and set of rules, and enable low transaction cost participation and the evolution of the market and its institutions as needed. That's still a conceit. Sometimes it works out well (e.g., EPA Acid Rain Program and SO2 emissions permit trading), most of the time, such a constructivist approach to coordination is not as successful as that example.
One thing I think we forget in talking about regulation and administrative law is that our entire legal system is still grounded in a robust evolved institution that has stood the test of time: common law. Some of what we use administrative law to do now used to be done through common law, and can be done through common law even more effectively now that we have new digital technologies to mediate our interactions, our contracts, our interdependencies.
To your question about externalities, we still face a knowledge problem because we can't estimate them well, and often can't even monitor or observe them in an actionable way. This is particularly true for GHG and that's one of several reasons why climate policy is so fraught. It's not as simple as "slap a tax on it to internalize it" as some Pigouvians will argue (and I say that despite believing that a federal carbon tax would be an economically superior policy to the Rube Goldberg patchwork of state RPS and other policies that have grown into the breach.
"Stasists believe that by entrusting authority to technical experts—whether they be scientists, engineers, economists, or bureaucrats—society can better predict and manage outcomes, ensuring safety, fairness, and order. The technocratic approach assumes that with the right data and expertise, a centralized authority can optimize decisions for the greater good”.
How, then, are we to characterize the world's most progressive country, China, which is miles ahead of us in every area of research and technology and whose leadership has been technocratic for millennia? They introduced fractional reserves against paper currency in the eleventh century and even discussed going pure fiat. They perfected vector tracing in the twelfth century and dynamic lockdowns in the thirteenth. And their recent bets on significant technology look prescient.
As you know, I find your claims about China fabulist and incompatible with considerable independent research and journalism. In many respects and on multiple dimensions China's approach is a case study in stasist technocracy.
In the past 26 years, have the open society and freedom been winning? Or have their enemies been winning?
Maybe there have been a few minor victories, but if we look around us, we see that the left's Long March through the American institutions is nearing total victory. What institutions are not controlled or becoming controlled by leftists?
If the ideas of Popper, Hayek, Postrel, et al are not enough--and it appears that they aren't--then something different and new is needed. Or else the enemies of progress and the future win in the end. And the end could be near.
Although I knew of it when it was published, I never read The Future and Its Enemies -- probably because I would agree with everything! It came out at the same time when some of us were developing ideas about decentralized processes and radical technological innovation in the free market-oriented transhumanist movement.
It would be lovely if I could speak at the next progress conference, perhaps on the Proactionary Principle. (Similar to Adam Thierer's Permissionless Innovation.)
Timely post as I am slogging through Power and Progress by Acemoglu and Johnson right now. They are arguing for a technocratic statist approach to AI and technology more broadly. Was hoping it would challenge my thinking a bit, but so far it is extremely underwhelming.
Good luck with that! I've been disappointed in how technocratic the AJR approach to current policies has been. Their Atlantic slave trade work, and the AR Why Nations Failed, were not so technocratic, but since they they have certainly leaned in to the idea that expert decision making can replace messy decentralized processes and yield better outcomes. I remain unpersuaded.
Lynne, i like the three rules be because i have collided with them many times in the british civil service. And where the hegemonic assumption is always to centralise for reasons of consistency. So Prostel’s ideas make some sense to me because i can relate them to my experience and what i see happening in my own country. That does not make me a fully signed up Hayekian, although his ideas are valuable along side others.
My issue with Postrel is whether she sees the lead up to the financial crash as a full vindication of the value of her ideas or would she modify them in the face of this experience. Hayek may well have left the financial system crash to avoid stasis. Bernanke did what he did…. As The expert. Whether we are in a better place i am not so sure, but i am less of an expert!
Keep writing as i always look out for your different take on society, Lawrence
Thank you Lawrence! From a Hayekian perspective the financial crisis was a consequence of, among other things, epistemic hubris, the conceit that government policy makers can guide such a complex system as an economy of 300 million people (let alone a global one of 6 billion, or however many we are now). Epistemic hubris is the signature conceit of technocracy.
Cracker article Lynne
Thanks Tim!
The solution again IMO is Sociocracy. I seek collaborators to try it and help promote it. Email me zzzzzzz@substack.com
Bookmarking this one, thank you.
Completely new to this arena - but after reading the article I had some queries, to see if they were talked about at this conference.
One on the permissions - to me it sounds like a full push to deregulation of markets and industries, is that the gist? If so I'm curious on whether there were discussions on market failures? Up to this point I'd thought fully unregulated markets had a tendency to create large wealth disparities, and, as they are unregulated, generally don't internalise environmental costs - leading to the kind of state of the world we're in today.
I'm fully on board with some deregulation, I'm an engineer, and have seen in my industry how red tape (usually well intentioned) can lead to delays in progress (often delaying the very types of technology the government is trying to support that catalysed the new regulation).
So I suppose my question is - how does a free market/deregulated/permission equality economy go about ensuring externalities are involved in costs?
Do we need these externalities or is there the aspect of "she'll be right" (an Aussie addage) as there would be a natural solution to these issues from innovations that are developed to fight them?
On that note, where does the line get drawn on regulation? Assumedly we don't want to get rid of all regulation, otherwise we could no longer rely on contracts to be fulfilled, banks to act in common interests, stock brokers not to lie, etc. Etc. So do we limit regulation to contracts? Should they be self imposed regulations designed to protect innovators, written by innovators [lawyers]? What does regulation look like in an unregulated system?
David Graeber in his book "The First 5000 Years of Debt", makes a convincing point that governments and regulation actually create and form new markets, which then multiplies areas of interest and diversity of thought. I'd love to hear an exchange between him and some of the speakers at the conference, I think it would be fascinating.
I've got so many questions, would love to hear whatever thoughts are out there.
Graeber's point about planned markets cuts two ways. In one sense it's an argument for decentralized coordination and using the price system as the nervous system it is and should be. But in another sense it's still grounded in an economic hubris that governments can identify a need, define a product, define a robust market design and set of rules, and enable low transaction cost participation and the evolution of the market and its institutions as needed. That's still a conceit. Sometimes it works out well (e.g., EPA Acid Rain Program and SO2 emissions permit trading), most of the time, such a constructivist approach to coordination is not as successful as that example.
One thing I think we forget in talking about regulation and administrative law is that our entire legal system is still grounded in a robust evolved institution that has stood the test of time: common law. Some of what we use administrative law to do now used to be done through common law, and can be done through common law even more effectively now that we have new digital technologies to mediate our interactions, our contracts, our interdependencies.
To your question about externalities, we still face a knowledge problem because we can't estimate them well, and often can't even monitor or observe them in an actionable way. This is particularly true for GHG and that's one of several reasons why climate policy is so fraught. It's not as simple as "slap a tax on it to internalize it" as some Pigouvians will argue (and I say that despite believing that a federal carbon tax would be an economically superior policy to the Rube Goldberg patchwork of state RPS and other policies that have grown into the breach.
"Stasists believe that by entrusting authority to technical experts—whether they be scientists, engineers, economists, or bureaucrats—society can better predict and manage outcomes, ensuring safety, fairness, and order. The technocratic approach assumes that with the right data and expertise, a centralized authority can optimize decisions for the greater good”.
How, then, are we to characterize the world's most progressive country, China, which is miles ahead of us in every area of research and technology and whose leadership has been technocratic for millennia? They introduced fractional reserves against paper currency in the eleventh century and even discussed going pure fiat. They perfected vector tracing in the twelfth century and dynamic lockdowns in the thirteenth. And their recent bets on significant technology look prescient.
As you know, I find your claims about China fabulist and incompatible with considerable independent research and journalism. In many respects and on multiple dimensions China's approach is a case study in stasist technocracy.
In the past 26 years, have the open society and freedom been winning? Or have their enemies been winning?
Maybe there have been a few minor victories, but if we look around us, we see that the left's Long March through the American institutions is nearing total victory. What institutions are not controlled or becoming controlled by leftists?
If the ideas of Popper, Hayek, Postrel, et al are not enough--and it appears that they aren't--then something different and new is needed. Or else the enemies of progress and the future win in the end. And the end could be near.
I work to bolster the forces of optimism and hold nihilism at bay.
Although I knew of it when it was published, I never read The Future and Its Enemies -- probably because I would agree with everything! It came out at the same time when some of us were developing ideas about decentralized processes and radical technological innovation in the free market-oriented transhumanist movement.
It would be lovely if I could speak at the next progress conference, perhaps on the Proactionary Principle. (Similar to Adam Thierer's Permissionless Innovation.)
Virginia's such a good writer that it's well worth reading even if you are in violent agreement.