Do Artifacts Have Politics? Author(s): Langdon Winner Source: Daedalus, Vol. 109, No. 1, Modern Technology: Problem or Opportunity?

(Winter, 1980), pp. 121-136 Published by: The MIT Press on behalf of American Academy of Arts & Sciences Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20024652 Accessed: 06/10/2009 20:50
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LANGDON WINNER

Do Artifacts Have Politics?

In controversies

about

technology

and

society,

there

is no

idea more

pro

than the notion that technical things have political qualities. At issue is the claim that the machines, structures, and systems of modern material culture can be not of efficiency and pro accurately judged only for their contributions side effects, ductivity, not merely for their positive and negative environmental can but also for the ways in which of forms power and they embody specific a of Since this kind have and in ideas presence authority. persistent troubling about the meaning of technology, discussions deserve attention.1 explicit they in Technology and Culture almost two decades ago, Lewis Mumford Writing
gave classic statement to one version of the theme, arguing that "from late neo

vocative

lithic times in the Near East, right down to our own day, two technologies have one authoritarian, the other democratic, the recurrently existed side by side: first system-centered, but the other unstable, immensely powerful, inherently but resourceful and durable."2 This thesis man-centered, relatively weak, stands at the heart of Mumford's studies of the city, architecture, and the his and mirrors concerns voiced earlier in the works of Peter tory of technics, Kropotkin,
ism. More America

William

Morris,
antinuclear a

and other nineteenth

and similar prosolar as notion

century
movements

critics of industrial
in in their Europe arguments. and

recently, have adopted

energy a centerpiece

Thus environmentalist Denis Hayes "The increased deployment of concludes, nuclear power facilities must lead society toward authoritarianism. Indeed, safe reliance upon nuclear power as the principal source of energy may be possible only in a totalitarian state." Echoing the views of many proponents of appropri ate and the soft energy path, Hayes contends that "dispersed solar technology sources are more compatible than centralized technologies with social equity, freedom and cultural pluralism."3 An eagerness to interpret technical artifacts in political language is by no means the exclusive property of critics of systems. large-scale high-technology A long lineage of boosters have insisted that the "biggest and best" that science and industry made available were the best guarantees of freedom, democracy, and social justice. The factory system, automobile, radio, television, telephone, the space program, and of course nuclear power itself have all at one time or another been described as democratizing, in liberating forces. David Lilienthal, T.V.A.: Democracy on theMarch, for example, found this promise in the phos

121

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phate fertilizers and electricity Americans during the 1940s.4 Daniel

presidents,

Boorstin

extolled

to rural that technical progress was bringing In a recent essay, The Republic of Technology, television for "its power to disband armies, to cashier
new democratic world?democratic in ways never

to create

a whole

kinds are deeply of arrangements have fundamen tally changed the exercise of power and the experience of citizenship. But to go to argue that certain technologies in themselves have beyond this obvious fact and at We all know first mistaken. seems, political properties glance, completely that people have politics, not things. To discover either virtues or evils in aggre seems and chemicals transistors, gates of steel, plastic, integrated circuits, a true human of artifice and of the way just plain wrong, mystifying avoiding sources and and human of freedom sources, the injustice. oppression, justice even more foolish than blaming the victims when Blaming the hardware appears it comes to judging conditions of public life. the stern advice commonly given those who flirt with the notion that Hence, is not technology technical artifacts have political qualities: What matters itself, but the social or economic system in which it is embedded. This maxim, which is the central premise of a theory that can be called in a number of variations It serves as a of technology, has an obvious wisdom. the social determination needed corrective to those who focus uncritically on such things as "the comput er and its social impacts" but who fail to look behind technical things to notice and use. This view of their development, the social circumstances deployment, an to idea that tech determinism?the antidote naive provides technological an as and of unmediated the internal sole result then, dynamic, nology develops to have not Those who fit its molds other influence, patterns. any society by are shaped by social and economic in the which ways technologies recognized
forces have not gotten very far.

before imagined, even in America."5 Scarcely a new invention someone does not proclaim it the salvation of a free society. It is no surprise to learn that technical systems of various in the conditions of modern politics. The physical interwoven and the like industrial production, warfare, communications,

comes

along that

taken literally, it suggests that But the corrective has its own shortcomings; technical things do not matter at all. Once one has done the detective work in to reveal the social origins?power holders behind a particular necessary of stance of technological will have impor everything explained change?one tance. This conclusion offers comfort to social scientists: it validates what they about the study had always suspected, namely, that there is nothing distinctive can return to their standard models of technology in the first place. Hence, they of interest group politics, bureaucratic politics, Marxist of social power?those have everything of class struggle, and the like?and models they need. The of technology social determination is, in this view, essentially no different from
the social determination of, say, welfare policy or taxation.

on a special are, however, good reasons technology has of late taken and scien in its own right for historians, fascination philosophers, political so reasons in ac of far models social science the standard tists; good only go most the and troublesome about for is what subject. In interesting counting social and political another place I have tried to show why so much of modern statements of what can be called a theory of tech thought contains recurring There

DO

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HAVE

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an odd of notions often crossbred with orthodox nological politics, mongrel The theory of technological and socialist liberal, conservative, philosophies.6 to the momentum of draws attention systems, large-scale sociotechnical politics to the response of modern societies to certain technological imperatives, and to In the all too common signs of the adaptation of human ends to technical means. so a novel framework of interpretation and explanation for some offers it doing of the more puzzling patterns that have taken shape in and around the growth of culture. One strength of this point of view is that it takes modern material technical artifacts seriously. Rather than insist that we immediately reduce to the interplay of social forces, it suggests that we pay attention to everything the characteristics of technical objects and the meaning of those characteristics. A necessary complement to, rather than a replacement for, theories of the social as this perspective determination of technology, identifies certain technologies own us to in It borrow Edmund their back, phenomena points political right. Husserl's injunction, to the things themselves. philosophical In what follows I shall offer outlines and illustrations of two ways in which artifacts can contain political properties. First are instances in which the inven tion, design, or arrangement of a specific technical device or system becomes a Seen in the proper light, way of settling an issue in a particular community. are of this kind and Second examples fairly straightforward easily understood. are cases of what can be called inherently political man-made sys technologies, tems that appear to require, or to be strongly compatible with, particular kinds of political relationships. about cases of this kind are much more Arguments troublesome and closer to the heart of the matter. By "politics," Imean arrange ments of power and authority in human associations as well as the activities that take place within those arrangements. For my purposes, here is "technology" to mean all of modern to understood I avoid but confusion practical artifice,7 to or or of smaller of hardware speak systems prefer technology, larger pieces of a specific kind. My intention is not to settle any of the issues here once and for and significance. all, but to indicate their general dimensions Technical Arrangements as Forms of Order

Anyone who has traveled the highways of America and has become used to a little odd about some the normal height of overpasses may well find something of the bridges over the parkways on New York. Many of the Long Island, are as as at the little nine feet of clearance low, having overpasses extraordinarily curb. Even those who happened to notice this structural peculiarity would not to it. In our accustomed way of look be inclined to attach any special meaning at we see like roads and the details of form as innocuous, and ing things bridges seldom give them a second thought. It turns out, however, that the two hundred or so low-hanging overpasses on were Island Long deliberately designed to achieve a particular social effect. Robert Moses, the master builder of roads, parks, bridges, and other public works from the 1920s to the 1970s in New York, had these overpasses built to that would discourage the presence of buses on his parkways. specifications to evidence According provided by Robert A. Caro in his biography of Moses, the reasons reflect Moses's social-class bias and racial prejudice. Automobile

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as he called them, owning whites of "upper" and "comfortable middle" classes, would be free to use the parkways for recreation and commuting. Poor people and blacks, who normally used public transit, were kept off the roads because One con the twelve-foot tall buses could not get through the overpasses. was access to limit of minorities and racial low-income sequence groups to Jones acclaimed public park. Moses made doubly sure of this Beach, Moses's widely to Jones result by vetoing a proposed extension of the Long Island Railroad
Beach.8

a story in recent American life is fasci political history, Robert Moses's and His with and his careful mayors, governors, nating. presidents, dealings of the and labor banks, unions, press, public opinion manipulation legislatures, are all matters that political scientists could study for years. But the most impor tant and enduring results of his work are his technologies, the vast engineering that York much of For New its form. after present projects give generations Moses has gone and the alliances he forged have fallen apart, his public works, and bridges he built to favor the use of the automobile especially the highways over the development of mass transit, will continue to shape that city. Many of structures of concrete and steel embody a systematic his monumental social a way of a after time, among people that, relationships engineering inequality, told becomes just another part of the landscape. As planner Lee Koppleman had "The old Caro about the low bridges on Wantagh Parkway, son-of-a-gun made sure that buses would never be able to use his goddamned parkways."9 of architecture, and public works contain many ex Histories city planning, that contain explicit or implicit political pur amples of physical arrangements broad Parisian poses. One can point to Baron Haussmann's thoroughfares, to prevent any recurrence of street at Louis direction Napoleon's engineered one can fighting of the kind that took place during the revolution of 1848. Or As
visit any number of grotesque concrete buildings and huge plazas constructed

on American campuses during the late 1960s and early 1970s to de university and instruments Studies of industrial machines fuse student demonstrations. also turn up interesting political stories, including some that violate our normal innovations are made in the first place. If about why technological expectations are introduced to achieve increased efficien we suppose that new technologies shows that we will sometimes be disappointed. cy, the history of technology a not the least of change expresses panoply of human motives, Technological over even some to have dominion which is the desire of others, though it may some to an occasional and violence the norm of sacrifice of cost-cutting require more from less. getting illustration can be found in the history of nineteenth One poignant century At Cyrus McCormick's industrial mechanization. reaper manufacturing plant in a new and largely in the middle 1880s, pneumatic molding machines, Chicago cost of at an estimated were added to the foundry untested innovation, we would of such In the standard economic $500,000. things, interpretation the plant and achieve the kind of expect that this step was taken to modernize efficiencies that mechanization brings. But historian Robert Ozanne has shown must be seen in a broader context. At the time, Cyrus the why development II was engaged in a battle with the National Union of Iron Mold McCormick as a way to "weed out the bad ers. He saw the addition of the new machines

DO

ARTIFACTS

HAVE

POLITICS?

125

element among the men," namely, the skilled workers who had organized the union local in Chicago.10 The new machines, manned by unskilled labor, ac at a cost inferior than the earlier process. After tually produced castings higher three years of use the machines were, in fact, abandoned, but by that time they had served their purpose?the destruction of the union. Thus, the story of these at the McCormick technical developments ade factory cannot be understood to outside the of record workers' attempts quately organize, police repression of in Chicago during that period, and the events the labor movement surrounding the bombing at Hay market Square. Technological history and American politi cal history were at that moment deeply intertwined. In cases like those of Moses's ma low bridges and McCormick's molding one sees use of the technical of chines, arrangements that precede the importance the things in question. can be used in ways that It is obvious that technologies enhance the power, authority, and privilege of some over others, for example, the use of television to sell a candidate. To our accustomed way of thinking, are seen as neutral tools that can be used well or technologies poorly, for good, in between. But we usually do not stop to a evil, or something inquire whether a a have device and built in been such that it way given might designed produces set of consequences logically and temporally prior to any of its professed uses. Robert Moses's bridges, after all, were used to carry automobiles from one point to another; McCormick's machines were used to make metal castings; both tech purposes far beyond their immediate use. If nologies, however, encompassed our moral and includes only cate political language for evaluating technology to not with and if do tools it does attention to the include uses, gories having our of the and we will be of then artifacts, meaning designs arrangements blinded to much that is intellectually and practically crucial. the point is most easily understood Because in the light of particular in tentions embodied in physical form, I have so far offered illustrations that seem almost conspiratorial. But to recognize the political dimensions in the shapes of not we does that look for conscious technology require conspiracies or malicious intentions. The organized movement of handicapped in the United people States during the 1970s pointed out the countless ways in which machines,
instruments, and structures of common use?buses, buildings, sidewalks,

plumbing fixtures, and so forth?made sons to move about a condition freely, to is life. It safe that say public designs
from long-standing neglect than from

it impossible for many handicapped per that systematically excluded them from arose more unsuited for the handicapped
anyone's active intention. But now that

the issue has been raised for public attention, it is evident that justice requires a are A now whole of artifacts and rebuilt to remedy. range being redesigned accommodate this minority. that have Indeed, many of the most important examples of technologies are those that transcend the political consequences simple categories of "in tended" and "unintended" are These instances in which the very altogether. of so technical a is in biased process development thoroughly particular direc tion that it regularly produces results counted as wonderful breakthroughs by some social interests and crushing setbacks by others. In such cases it is neither correct nor intended to do somebody else harm." insightful to say, "Someone one must that the deck has been stacked long in ad Rather, say technological

126
vanee to favor certain social

LANGDON interests,

WINNER and that some were bound to

people

receive

a better

hand

a remarkable device re The mechanical perfected by searchers at the University of California from the late 1940s to the present, offers an illustrative tale. The machine is able to harvest tomatoes in a single a the from the ground, shaking the fruit loose, row, cutting pass through plants and in the newest models into large plastic sorting the tomatoes electronically tons of produce headed for gondolas that hold up to twenty-five canning. To accommodate the rough motion of these "factories in the field," agricultural
researchers have bred new varieties of tomatoes that are hardier, sturdier, and

than others. tomato harvester,

less tasty. The harvesters replace the system of handpicking, in which crews of farmworkers would pass through the fields three or four times putting ripe to matoes in lug boxes and saving immature fruit for later harvest.11 Studies in California indicate that the machine reduces costs by approximately five to sev en dollars per ton as But the benefits are by no compared to hand-harvesting.12 means divided in the In in the fact, the machine equally agricultural economy. a in has this instance been the occasion for of social garden thorough reshaping tomato in of rural California. production relationships the ma By their very size and cost, more than $50,000 each to purchase, chines are compatible only with a highly concentrated form of tomato growing. With the introduction of this new method of harvesting, the number of tomato declined from in four thousand the growers approximately early 1960s to about in 1973, yet with a substantial six hundred increase in tons of tomatoes pro duced. thousand By the late 1970s an estimated thirty-two jobs in the tomato as a direct consequence had eliminated of mechanization.13 been Thus, industry a jump in productivity to the benefit of very large growers has occurred at a sacrifice to other rural agricultural communities.
The University of California's research and development on agricultural ma

like the tomato harvester is at attorneys for California Rural Legal a group of farmworkers and other are officials University spending tax chines
ful of private interests to the detriment

this time the subject of a law suit filed by an Assistance, representing organization suit charges that interested parties. The on projects that benefit a hand monies
of farmworkers, small farmers, con

sumers, and rural California generally, and asks for a court injunction to stop the has denied these charges, practice. The University arguing that to accept them "would require elimination of all research with any potential practical
application."14

of the tomato far as I know, no one has argued that the development was the result of a plot. Two students of the controversy, William Friedland and Amy Barton, specifically exonerate both the original developers of the machine and the hard tomato from any desire to facilitate economic con As harvester see here instead is an social ongoing industry.15 What we scientific knowledge, invention, and corporate process in which technological profit reinforce each other in deeply entrenched patterns that bear the unmistak able stamp of political and economic power. Over many decades agricultural in American has research and development land-grant colleges and universities It is in the face of tended to favor the interests of large agribusiness concerns.16 such subtly ingrained patterns that opponents of innovations like the tomato centration in that

DO harvester are made to seem

ARTIFACTS

HAVE

POLITICS? or "antiprogress." For the harves

127

"antitechnology"

ter is not merely the symbol of a social order that rewards some while punishing of that order. others; it is in a true sense an embodiment Within a given category of technological change there are, roughly speaking, two kinds of choices that can affect the relative distribution of power, authority, and privilege in a community. Often the crucial decision is a simple "yes or no" or not? In recent years we going to develop and adopt the choice?are thing international about and national, local, many disputes technology have centered on "yes or no" judgments about such things as food additives, pesticides, the nuclear reactors, and dam projects. The fundamental building of highways, or not the to join choice about an ABM or an SST is whether thing is going are a as fre of its Reasons for and against society piece operating equipment. as important as those concerning the adoption of an important new law. quently A second range of choices, equally critical inmany instances, has to do with or arrangement of a technical system after the specific features in the design decision to go ahead with it has already been made. Even after a utility company can to build a large electric power line, important controversies wins permission remain with respect to the placement of its route and the design of its towers; con even after an organization has decided to institute a system of computers, to can the kinds of arise with still troversies programs, components, regard modes of access, and other specific features the system will include. Once the tomato harvester had been developed in its basic form, design altera mechanical addition of electronic tion of critical social significance?the sorters, for ex on effects the balance of wealth the character of the machine's ample?changed and power in California Some of the most interesting research on agriculture. in a and politics at present focuses on the attempt to demonstrate technology concrete fashion how seemingly innocuous design features in mass detailed, transit systems, water projects, and other technologies industrial machinery, David Noble is of mask choices Historian social actually profound significance. now two have kinds automated machine tool that different of systems studying and labor in the industries implications for the relative power of management that might employ them. He is able to show that, although the basic electronic of the record/playback and mechanical and numerical control sys components
tems are similar, the choice of one design over another has crucial consequences

for social struggles cutting, efficiency,

element in the

on the shop floor. To or the modernization

see the matter solely in terms of cost of equipment is to miss a decisive

story.17

The From such examples I would offer the following general conclusions. we call our world. Many are ways of in order things "technologies" building for technical devices and systems important in everyday life contain possibilities or not, deliber many different ways of ordering human activity. Consciously or inadvertently, societies choose structures for technologies that influence ately
how people are going to work, communicate, travel, consume, and so forth over

a very are made, structuring decisions long time. In the processes by which situated and possess unequal degrees of power as different people are differently well as unequal levels of awareness. By far the greatest latitude of choice exists the very first time a particular instrument, is introduced. system, or technique Because choices tend to become strongly fixed inmaterial equipment, economic

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investment,

LANGDON

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vanishes for all practical and social habit, the original flexibility are once In initial commitments made. that sense technological the purposes that establish a innovations are similar to legislative acts or political foundings For that framework for public order that will endure over many generations.
reason, the same careful attention one would give to the rules, roles, and rela

to such as the tionships of politics must also be given things building of high and the of television the creation networks, ways, tailoring of seemingly on new machines. The issues that divide or unite features people in insignificant are not in and of the institutions settled practices society politics proper, only but also,
wires and

and

less obviously,
nuts and

in tangible
bolts.

arrangements

of steel and concrete,

transistors,

Inherently

Political

Technologies

None of the arguments and examples considered thus far address a stronger, more and society?the troubling claim often made in writings about technology are by their very nature political in a specific way. belief that some technologies to this view, the adoption of a given technical system unavoidably According that have a distinctive political it conditions for human relationships with brings
cast?for example, centralized or decentralized, egalitarian or inegalitarian, re

pressive or liberating. This is ultimately what is at stake in assertions like those one authoritarian, the of Lewis Mumford that two traditions of technology, cases I In cited all the other democratic, exist side by side inWestern history. are relatively flexible in design and arrangement, and above the technologies one can recognize a particular result produced variable in their effects. Although in a particular setting, one can also easily imagine how a roughly similar device or situated with very much different political or system might have been built
consequences. The idea we must now examine and evaluate is that certain kinds

and that to choose them is to choose of technology do not allow such flexibility, a particular form of political life. A remarkably forceful statement of one version of this argument appears in anar in 1872. Answering Friedrich Engels's little essay "On Authority" written chists who believed that authority is an evil that ought to be abolished altogeth for authoritarianism, er, Engels launches into a panegyric among maintaining, in modern other things, that strong authority is a necessary condition industry. To advance his case in the strongest possible way, he asks his readers to imagine a social revolution de that the revolution has already occurred. "Supposing throned the capitalists, who now exercise their authority over the production to adopt entirely the point of view of the and circulation of wealth. Supposing, land and the instruments of labour had become the that the anti-authoritarians, use them. Will of the workers who collective property authority have dis or its form?"18 it have will only changed appeared His answer draws upon lessons from three sociotechnical systems of his day,
cotton-spinning mills, railways, and ships at sea. He observes that, on its way to

becoming tions at different

tasks, from

finished

thread, through locations in the factory. The workers

the steam engine to carrying the

cotton moves

a number

of different opera perform a wide variety of

from one room to

running

products

another. Because work

these tasks must

is "fixed by the authority

and because be coordinated, of the steam," laborers must

the timing of the learn to accept a

DO

ARTIFACTS

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129

to at regular hours and Engels, work according rigid discipline. They must, to to wills the their individual subordinate persons in charge of factory agree to that produc do the If risk fail so, they horrifying possibility operations. they "The automatic tion will come to a grinding halt. Engels pulls no punches. "is much more despotic than the small of a big factory," he writes, machinery
capitalists who employ workers ever have been."19

are adduced in Engels's analysis of the necessary operating of for railways and ships at sea. Both require the subordination conditions workers to an "imperious authority" that sees to it that things run according to an idiosyncracy of capitalist social organ plan. Engels finds that, far from being of all arise "independently and subordination of ization, relationships authority us are condi with the material social organization, [and] together imposed upon tions under which we produce and make products circulate." Again, he intends this to be stern advice to the anarchists who, according to Engels, thought it at a single to and subordination eradicate superordination simply possible Similar lessons
stroke. All such schemes are nonsense. The roots of unavoidable author

in the human involvement with itarianism are, he argues, deeply implanted "If man, by dint of his knowledge and inventive genius, science and technology. has subdued the forces of nature, the latter avenge themselves upon him by a as he independ employs them, to veritable despotism subjecting him, insofar ent of all social organization."20 to justify strong authority on the basis of supposedly necessary Attempts conditions of technical practice have an ancient history. A pivotal theme in the Republic is Plato's quest to borrow the authority of techn? and employ it by analo the illus gy to buttress his argument in favor of authority in the state. Among is that of a ship on the high seas. Because large trations he chooses, like Engels, nature need to be steered with a firm hand, sailors sailing vessels by their very must yield to their captain's commands; no reasonable person believes that ships a state is can be run democratically. Plato goes on to suggest that governing as a physician. rather like being captain of a ship or like practicing medicine
Much nized the same conditions activity also that technical require create this central need in rule and decisive action in orga government.

argument, and arguments like it, the justification for authority is no made by Plato's classic analogy, but rather directly with reference to longer as Engels believed If the basic case is as compelling it to be, itself. technology one would expect that, as a society adopted increasingly complicated technical systems as its material basis, the prospects for authoritarian ways of life would In Engels's be greatly enhanced. Central control by knowledgeable people acting at the top In this respect, his of a rigid social hierarchy would seem increasingly prudent. to at Karl stand in "On Authority" be variance with Marx's appears position in will Volume One of Capital. Marx tries to show that increasing mechanization render obsolete dination
manufacturing.

that,

the hierarchical division of labor and the relationships of subor in his view, were necessary during the early stages of modern
The "Modern Industry," he writes, "... sweeps away by

technical means the manufacturing division of labor, under which each man is bound hand and foot for life to a single detail operation. At the same time, the this same division of labour in a capitalistic form of that industry reproduces in still more monstrous the the workman shape; factory proper, by converting
into a living appendage of the machine. . . ."21 In Marx's view, the conditions

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that will eventually dissolve the capitalist division of labor and facilitate prole tarian revolution are conditions latent in industrial technology itself. The dif in Capital and Engels's in his essay raise an ferences between Marx's position after all, does modern important question for socialism: What, technology make in political life? The theoretical tension we see here mir possible or necessary rors many troubles in the practice of freedom and authority that have muddied the tracks of socialist revolution. are in some sense to the effect that inherently politi Arguments technologies
cal have here. been In my advanced reading of in a wide such variety notions, of contexts, far there too are however, many two to summarize basic ways of

case. One version claims that the adoption of a stating the given technical sys tem actually requires the creation and maintenance of a particular set of social conditions as the operating environment of that system. Engels's position is of this kind. A similar view is offered by a contemporary writer who holds that "if
you accept nuclear power plants, you also accept a techno-scientific-industrial

in charge, you could not have nuclear elite. Without these people military some In of technology this kinds power."29 conception, require their social en
vironments to be structured in a particular way in much the same sense that

an automobile in order to run. The thing could not exist as an requires wheels certain social as well as material effective operating unless conditions entity were met. The meaning of "required" here is that of practical (rather than logi cal) necessity. Thus, Plato thought it a practical necessity that a ship at sea have one captain and an obedient crew. unquestioningly A second, somewhat weaker, version of the argument holds that a given kind of technology is strongly compatible with, but does not strictly require, of a particular stripe. Many social and political relationships advocates of solar are now more that hold that of energy variety compatible with a technologies
democratic, clear energy power; requires society egalitarian same at the time democracy. Their than they energy do not case systems maintain that based that solar on coal, oil, and nu solar anything energy about

is, briefly,

is decentral

a technical and political sense: technically it is vastly speaking, izing in both more reasonable to build solar systems in a disaggregated, distributed widely manner than in speaking, solar energy large-scale centralized plants; politically to manage and local communities accommodates the attempts of individuals because they are dealing with systems that are more their affairs effectively sources. In than huge centralized and controllable accessible, comprehensible, this view, solar energy is desirable not only for its economic and environmental it is likely to permit in other areas benefits, but also for the salutary institutions of public life.23 to be there is a further distinction Within both versions of the argument of a given technical that are internal to the workings made between conditions internal social system and those that are external to it. Engels's thesis concerns cotton to and within factories relations said be required railways, for example; a mean of for the condition what such relationships society at large is for him
separate question. In contrast, the solar advocate's belief that solar technologies

are

compatible
removed

with
from

democracy
the

pertains

to the way
of those

they complement
as such.

aspects of

society

organization

technologies

are, then, several different directions that arguments of this kind can follow. Are the social conditions predicated said to be required by, or strongly There

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131

compatible with, the workings of a given technical system? Are those conditions internal to that system or external to it (or both)? Although writings that address such questions are often unclear about what is being asserted, arguments in this an important presence in modern political discourse. general category do have enter to into how many attempts They explain changes in social life take place in the wake of technological innovation. More they are often used importantly, to buttress attempts to justify or criticize proposed courses of action involving new or technology. By offering distinctly political reasons for against the adop tion of a particular technology, arguments of this kind stand apart from more more commonly employed, easily quantifiable claims about economic costs and benefits, environmental impacts, and possible risks to public health and safety that technical systems may involve. The issue here does not concern how many jobs will be created, how much income generated, how many pollutants added, or how many cancers produced. Rather, the issue has to do with ways in which choices about technology have important consequences for the form and quality
of human associations.

examine social patterns that comprise the environments of technical we to specific find certain devices and almost linked systems, systems invariably of and The is: Does this ways organizing power authority. important question state of affairs derive from an unavoidable social response to intractable proper ties in the things themselves, or is it instead a pattern imposed independently by a governing body, ruling class, or some other social or cultural institution to further its own purposes? most obvious example, the atom bomb is an Taking the inherently political artifact. As long as it exists at all, its lethal properties demand that it be con trolled by a centralized, chain of command closed to all rigidly hierarchical influences that might make its workings unpredictable. The internal social sys tem of the bomb must be authoritarian; there is no other way. The state of affairs stands as a practical necessity independent of any larger political system in which the bomb is embedded, independent of the kind of regime or character
of its rulers. structures Indeed, and democratic mentality states that must try to find the ways to ensure of that the social characterize management nuclear

If we

weapons do not "spin off' or "spill over" into the polity as a whole. The bomb is, of course, a special case. The reasons very rigid relationships
of authority are necessary in its immediate presence should be clear to anyone.

look for other instances in which particular varieties of tech If, however, are of a special pattern of power nology widely perceived to need the maintenance and authority, modern technical history contains a wealth of examples. a monumental in The Visible Hand, Alfred D. Chandler study of modern to defend the hypothe business enterprise, presents impressive documentation
sis that the construction and day-to-day operation a of many systems of produc

we

tion,
centuries

transportation,
require the

and

communication
of particular

in the nineteenth
social form?a

and

twentieth
cen

development

large-scale

tralized, Typical

hierarchical of Chandler's

organization reasoning

administered is his analysis

skilled managers. by highly of the growth of the railroads.

but safe, re

made possible Technology liable movement of goods and repair of locomotives,

fast, all-weather and passengers, rolling stock,

transportation; as the as well and track,

continuing stations, roadbed,

regular, maintenance round

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houses, and other

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of a sizable the creation administrative equipment, required to It meant of a set of managers the employment these supervise organization. over an extensive activities functional of an area; and the appointment geographical to monitor, administrative command and of middle and top executives evaluate, coordinate the work of managers responsible for the day-to-day operations.

Throughout production trial goods

his book Chandler points to ways inwhich technologies used in the and distribution of electricity, chemicals, and a wide range of indus "demanded" or "required" this form of human association. "Hence, of railroads demanded the creation of the first the operational requirements in American administrative hierarchies business."25 Were there other conceivable ways of organizing these aggregates of people and apparatus? Chandler shows that a previously dominant social form, the small traditional family firm, simply could not handle the task in most cases. he does not speculate further, it is clear that he believes there is, to be Although realistic, very within modern nologies?oil little latitude sociotechnical pipelines in the forms of power and authority appropriate tech systems. The properties of many modern such that over and refineries, for example?are If such of scale and speed are possible. economies

impressive whelmingly systems are to work effectively, efficiently, quickly, and safely, certain require ments of internal social organization have to be fulfilled; the material possi available could not be exploited bilities make that modern technologies as one institu that otherwise. Chandler compares sociotechnical acknowledges tions of different nations, one sees "ways in which cultural attitudes, values,

and social structure affect these imperatives."26 systems, ideologies, political But the weight of argument and empirical evidence in The Visible Hand suggests that any significant departure from the basic pattern would be, at best, highly unlikely.
It may example, prove be those capable of that of other conceivable decentralized, administering of arrangements worker democratic factories, refineries, power and authority, for could systems, self-management, communications

and railroads as well as or better than the organizations teams in Sweden from automobile Evidence assembly
plants in Yugoslavia and other countries is often presented

describes. Chandler and worker-managed

to salvage these pos

over this matter here, but I shall not be able to settle controversies sibilities. to to be their bone of contention. The available what I consider merely point evidence tends to show that many large, sophisticated systems are technological control. The in fact highly compatible with centralized, hierarchical managerial to do with whether or not this pattern is in has however, interesting question,
any sense a requirement of such systems, a question that is not solely an empiri

rests on our judgments cal one. The matter ultimately are practically necessary in the workings of particular
what, if anything, such measures require of the structure

about what
of human

steps,

kinds of technology

if any, and

associations.

Was Plato right in saying that a ship at sea needs steering by a decisive hand and an obedient crew? that this could only be accomplished by a single captain and Is Chandler correct in saying that the properties of large-scale systems require control? hierarchical managerial centralized,
To answer such questions, we w7ould have to examine in some detail the

moral

claims of practical

necessity

(including

those advocated

in the doctrines

of

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ARTIFACTS

HAVE

POLITICS?

133

economics) and weigh them against moral claims of other sorts, for example, the in the command of a ship or that notion that it is good for sailors to participate in a workers have a right to be involved in making and administering decisions on It of based is characteristic societies factory. large, complex technological
systems, however, that moral reasons other than those of practical necessity

claims one "idealistic," and irrelevant. Whatever appear increasingly obsolete, or on can to wish make behalf of be may immediately liberty, justice, equality neutralized when confronted with arguments to the effect: "Fine, but that's no
way to run a railroad" (or steel mill, or airline, or communications system, and

so on). Here we encounter an important quality in modern political discourse are justified in think about what measures and in the way people commonly to the make In available. response many instances, to possibilities technologies are inherently political is to say that certain widely say that some technologies reasons of the need to maintain crucial accepted practical necessity?especially as to entities?have tended systems eclipse smoothly working technological other sorts of moral and political reasoning. One attempt to salvage the autonomy of politics from the bind of practical involves the notion that conditions of human association found in the necessity of technological internal workings systems can easily be kept separate from the a as whole. Americans have polity long rested content in the belief that arrange ments of power and authority inside industrial corporations, public utilities, and the like have little bearing on public institutions, and ideas at practices, was as a at the factory gates" taken fact of life that stops large. That "democracy had nothing to do with the practice of political freedom. But can the internal and the politics of the whole community be so easily politics of technology recent ex A of American business leaders, contemporary separated? study of Chandler's "visible hand of found them emplars management," remarkably
impatient with such democratic scruples as "one man, one vote." If democracy

doesn't work executives

for the firm, the most critical institution in all of society, American of a ask, how well can it be expected to work for the government
when that government attempts to interfere with the

nation?particularly

achievements of the firm? The authors of the report observe that patterns of that in the corporation become for businessmen work "the authority effectively desirable model against which to compare political and economic relationships in the rest of society."27 While such findings are far from conclusive, they do common reflect a sentiment in the land: what dilemmas like the increasingly of wealth or broader public partici energy crisis require is not a redistribution
pation but, rather, stronger, centralized public management?President Carter's

proposal for an Energy Mobilization An especially vivid case in which

Board

and the like.

the operational requirements of a technical influence the of system might quality public life is now at issue in debates about the risks of nuclear power. As the supply of uranium for nuclear reactors runs as a in out, a proposed alternative fuel is the plutonium generated by-product
reactor ceptable cores. Well-known costs, economic objections its risks of to plutonium environmental recycling contamination, focus on and its unac its dan

gers
these

in regard
concerns,

to the
however,

international
stands

proliferation
another less

of nuclear
widely

weapons.
set

Beyond
of haz

appreciated

ards?those

that involve

the sacrifice of civil

liberties. The

widespread

use of

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as a fuel increases the chance that this toxic substance plutonium might be sto len by terrorists, organized crime, or other persons. This raises the prospect, and not a trivial one, that extraordinary measures would have to be taken to from theft and to recover it if ever the substance were safeguard plutonium as in the nuclear stolen. Workers industry as well ordinary citizens outside covert surveillance, could well become subject to background checks, security
wiretapping, informers, and even emergency measures under martial law?all

justified by the need to safeguard plutonium. Russell W. Ayres's recycling study of the legal ramifications of plutonium concludes: "With the passage of time and the increase in the quantity of pluto to eliminate the traditional checks the nium in existence will come pressure courts and legislatures place on the activities of the executive and to develop a to enforce strict safeguards." He avers powerful central authority better able that "once a quantity of plutonium had been stolen, the case for literally turning the country upside down to get it back would be overwhelming."31 Ayres antic I have of the kinds about and worries thinking that, argued, characterize ipates true that, in a world in which human It is still inherently political technologies. is "required" in an absolute beings make and maintain artificial systems, nothing
sense. Nevertheless, once a course of action is underway, once artifacts like

the kinds of reason nuclear power plants have been built and put in operation, to technical life of social the pop up as requirements adaptation ing that justify "Once recycling be as flowers in the spring. In Ayres's words, spontaneously the theft become real rather than hypothetical, gins and the risks of plutonium seem will case for compelling."28 infringement of protected rights governmental and im After a certain point, those who cannot accept the hard requirements as dreamers and fools. will be dismissed peratives
* * *

I have outlined indicate how artifacts can The two varieties of interpretation in which specific In the first instance we noticed ways have political qualities. of a device or system could provide a features in the design or arrangement in a given convenient means of establishing patterns of power and authority a range of flexibility in of the dimensions of this kind have setting. Technologies form. It is precisely because they are flexible that their con their material sequences for society must be understood with reference to the social actors able are chosen. In the second instance to influence which designs and arrangements we examined ways in which the intractable properties of certain kinds of tech are linked to particular institutionalized nology strongly, perhaps unavoidably, of and initial about the choice whether or not power patterns authority. Here, to adopt something There are no alter is decisive in regard to its consequences. or arrangements that would make a significant dif native physical designs no for creative intervention ference; there are, furthermore, genuine possibilities or different socialist?that could social systems?capitalist change the intrac by or alter of its the quality political effects. tability of the entity significantly is applicable in a given case is often To know which variety of interpretation some of them passionate ones, about the meaning of what is at stake in disputes, we live. I have argued a "both/and" position here, for it for how technology

DO

ARTIFACTS

HAVE

POLITICS?

135

seems to me stances.
a system of

are applicable in different circum that both kinds of understanding a can that within it Indeed, happen particular complex of technology?
communication or transportation, for example?some aspects may

in their possibilities for society, while other aspects may be (for be flexible I intractable. The two varieties of interpretation better or worse) completely
have examined here can overlap and intersect at many points.

some issues on which people can disagree. Thus, are, of course, now resources at from renewable believe of have last proponents energy they a set of communitarian tech discovered intrinsically democratic, egalitarian, the social consequences In my best estimation, of build however, nologies. on will the specific configurations ing renewable energy systems surely depend of both hardware and the social institutions created to bring that energy to us. It may be that we will find ways to turn this silk purse into a sow's ear. By com of nuclear power seem to believe parison, advocates of the further development that they are working on a rather flexible technology whose adverse social ef fects can be fixed by changing the design parameters of reactors and nuclear waste disposal systems. For reasons indicated above, I believe them to be dead wrong in that faith. Yes, we may be able to manage some of the "risks" to public health and safety that nuclear power brings. But as society adapts to the more These indelible features of nuclear power, what will be the dangerous and apparently in toll human freedom? long-range My belief that we ought to attend more closely to technical objects them selves is not to say that we can ignore the contexts in which those objects are situated. A ship at sea may well require, as Plato and Engels insisted, a single captain and obedient crew. But a ship out of service, parked at the dock, needs a caretaker. To understand which and which contexts are only technologies an to must and is that involve both the study of us, important why, enterprise as as a technical and their well systems specific history thorough grasp of the our and controversies of In times concepts political theory. people are often to to make in drastic the live accord with way they willing changes technological innovation at the same time they would resist similar kinds of changes justified on political If for no other reason than that, it is important for us to grounds.
achieve a clearer view of these matters than has been our habit so far.

like to thank Merritt Roe Smith, Leo Marx, David Noble, Charles James Miller, Loren Graham, Gail Stuart, Dick Sclove, and Stephen Graubard for their Weiner, Sherry Turkle, comments on earlier drafts of this essay. and criticisms thanks also to Doris Morrison of the My of California, for her bibliographical Agriculture Library of the University Berkeley, help. 2Lewis Mumford, "Authoritarian and Democratic 5 (1964): Technics," Technology and Culture, 1-8. 3 Denis Hayes, Rays ofHope: The Transition to a Post-Petroleum World (New York: W. W. Norton, 1977), pp. 71, 159. 4David Lilienthal, 72-83. T. V.A.: Democracy on the March (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1944), pp.

References ll would

5Daniel J. Boorstin, The Republic of & Row, 1978), p. 7. Technology (New York: Harper as a Theme in Political Autonomous Technology: Technics-out-of-Control 6Langdon Winner, Thought 1977). Press, (Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. 7The meaning of I not in some this does of the broader essay encompass "technology" employ definitions ofthat found in contemporary for example, the notion of "technique" literature, concept

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in the writings of Jacques Ellul. My purposes here are more limited. For a discussion of the diffi to define see Ref. 6, pp. 8-12. that arise in attempts "technology," 8Robert A. Caro, The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York (New York: Random 1974), pp. 318, 481, 514, 546, 951-958. House, 9Ibid., p. 952. 10Robert Ozanne, A Century of Labor-Management Relations atMcCormick and International Harvest er (Madison, Wis.: of Wisconsin Press, 1967), p. 20. University 11 The of the tomato harvester is told in Wayne D. Rasmussen, "Advances in early history as a Case American The Mechanical Tomato Harvester Agriculture: Study," Technology and Culture, 531-543. 9(1968): 12Andrew Schmitz and David "Mechanized and Social Welfare: The Case Seckler, Agriculture of the Tomato American Journal of Agricultural 52 (1970): 569-577. Harvester," Economics, 13William H. Friedland and Amy Barton, "Tomato Technology," 13:6 (September/Oc Society, tober 1976). See also William H. Friedland, Social Sleepwalkers: Scientific and Technological Research in of California, of Applied Behavioral Davis, Department Sciences, California Agriculture, University No. Research Monograph 13, 1974. 1, 1979. 14University of California Clip Sheet, 54:36, May 15Friedland and Barton, "Tomato Technology." 16A history and critical analysis of agricultural research in the land-grant is given in colleges Hard Tomatoes, Hard Times (Cambridge, Mass.: Schenkman, 1978). James Hightower, 17David Noble, inMachine "Social Choice The Case of Automatically Controlled Design: in Case Studies in the Labor Process (New York: Monthly chine Tools," Review Press, forthcoming). 18Friedrich Engels, "On Authority" in The Marx-Engels Reader, 2nd ed., Robert Tucker (New York: W. W. Norton, 1978), p. 731. "Ibid. 20Ibid., pp. 732, 731. 21Karl Marx, vol. 1, 3rd ed., Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling (trans.) (New York: Capital, The Modern 1906), p. 530. Library, Four Arguments for the Elimination (New York: William Morrow, of Television 22Jerry Mander, 1978), p. 44. The Sun Builders: A Barbara Emanuel, and Stephen Graham, 23See, for example, Robert Argue, to Solar, Wind and Wood Energy in Canada (Toronto: Renewable in Canada, People's Guide Energy is an implicit component of renewable this implies the 1978). "We think decentralization energy; decentralization of energy systems, communities and of power. Renewable energy doesn't require sources of Our cities and towns, which mammoth transmission corridors. disruptive generation on some to achieve have been dependent centralized energy supplies, may be able degree of auton their own energy needs" and administering omy, thereby controlling (p. 16). in American Business (Cam Revolution 24Alfred D. Chandler, Jr., The Visible Hand: The Managerial Press, 1977), p. 244. Belknap, Harvard University bridge, Mass.: 2sIbid. 26Ibid., p. 500. Ethics and Profits: The Crisis of Confidence in American Business 27Leonard Silk and David Vogel, and Schuster, (New York: Simon 1976), p. 191. The Civil Liberties 28Russel W. Ayres, Fallout," Harvard Civil Rights-Civil "Policing Plutonium: 374. 10 (1975):443, Liberties Law Review, 413-4, Ma (ed.)