1. UTOPIAN VS DYSTOPIAN VISIONS
JUS 394: cyberpolitics
at arizona state university
tempe, february 2nd, 2007
professor: merlyna lim

5. UTOPIA
Eu-topos: denoting a region of happiness and perfection
Ou-topos: naming a region that nowhere exists.
“GOOD PLACE”
Utopia as a possible response given to anxieties and pessimistic
perspectives as well as to unsatisfied hopes and dreams of people,
predominantly epitomizes an ideal and desired place which more or less
sharply contrasts to the 'hic et nunc' of the place of reality.

7. UTOPIA:
A society or place that is
perfect or ideal
Technological utopianism is a form of analyses that places the
use of some specific technology; computers, nuclear energy, or
low-energy low-impact technologies as the central enabling
element of a utopian vision. Technological utopianism does not
refer to a set of technologies. It refers to analyses in which the
use of specific technologies plays a key role in shaping a
utopian social vision in which their use easily makes life
enchanting and liberating for nearly everyone.

8. DYSTOPIA
A society or place whose imperfection
is perfect or who's evil is ideal
In contrast, technological anti-utopianism examines how
certain broad families of technology facilitate a social order
that is relentlessly harsh, destructive, and miserable.

9. UTOPIAN NARRATIVES
Order is good. Most utopian narratives will take an instrumental view of technology,
meaning:
•Technology is a product of humans in the service of humans
•It may be used for good or ill
•It is able to be mastered
Technology can better our lives by making them more ordered
Technology can solve problems, even problems that technology creates. As a result problems
are solved by increasing complexity and increasing order
Progress is an essentially good thing and progress requires order
Secrecy enhances freedom and privacy
Secrecy is power

10. DYSTOPIAN NARRATIVES
Technological Innovation is always resisted
•Fear of technology in the workplace; Fear of replacement
Technology changes behavior and patterns of behavior
Technology is connected to or evolves into the state, creating a state of quot;authoritarian
information technologyquot;
•basic assumptions individual obedience to governmental authority
•government creation of a rational social order
•control is maintained by a technocracy
Technology is panoptical
Information Overload
•Confusion ; Quality vs. Quantity
As instrumental technology is unable to be mastered, people become more quot;objectsquot; to be
quot;orderedquot;. Humans, as essentially quot;unorderedquot; or quot;unpredictablequot; threaten order
Technology becomes about surveillance, yechnology stiffles freedom and privacy
Secrecy is institutionalized; Privacy is outlawed

11. believe it or not.........
futurists tend to repeat the same utopian narrative.....
for each and every emerging technology........

12. Does it not mean the breakdown of artificial national barriers
and the welding of humanity into one composite whole? Does
it not mean that each is given a chance to comprehend the
significance of national and international affairs, and that all
the evils of jealousy and hatred being thus displayed before
the world will no longer fester, but be cleansed by the
antiseptic of common understanding and common sense?

13. Does it not mean the breakdown of artificial national barriers
and the welding of humanity into one composite whole? Does
it not mean that each is given a chance to comprehend the
significance of national and international affairs, and that all
the evils of jealousy and hatred being thus displayed before
the world will no longer fester, but be cleansed by the
antiseptic of common understanding and common sense?
Radio (Lewis, 1924: 144)

14. When we entered Cambridge [Mass. USA] we found an
apathetic, dispirited community, afraid to discuss its problems.
In the past few weeks we have watched a ferment grow in this
town. We have watched people as they began to talk about their
problems in the open - for the first time. This talk need not, and
must not, end with the .......................

15. When we entered Cambridge [Mass. USA] we found an
apathetic, dispirited community, afraid to discuss its problems.
In the past few weeks we have watched a ferment grow in this
town. We have watched people as they began to talk about their
problems in the open - for the first time. This talk need not, and
must not, end with the television program
Community television (Siepmann, 1952)

16. ………………….. will be subversive to any group,
bureaucracy or individual which feels threatened by a
coalescing of grassroots consciousness. Because not only
does decentralised …………………. serve as an early
warning system, it puts people in touch with each
other about common grievances.

17. Community video will be subversive to any group,
bureaucracy or individual which feels threatened by a
coalescing of grassroots consciousness. Because not only
does decentralised community video serve as an early
warning system, it puts people in touch with each
other about common grievances.
Community video (Shamburg, 1971)

18. …………...: the awakening of a new era. The town
comes into the village, the village comes into the town,
the separation comes to an end, town and village merge
more and more. ………………………………………, that is
the new time with richer, broader and more mobile
civilisation, a back to nature which however, keeps all
advantages of culture.

19. The bicycle: the awakening of a new era. The town comes
into the village, the village comes into the town, the
separation comes to an end, town and village merge
more and more. Cyclisation: the era of the bicycle, that
is the new time with richer, broader and more mobile
civilisation, a back to nature which however, keeps all
advantages of culture .
(Schroderin about 1873,
quoted by Timm, 1984:149)

20. Over the course of a few years a new communications technology
annihilated distance and shrank the world faster and further than ever
before. A world wide communications network whose cables spanned
continents and oceans, it revolutionised business practice and gave rise
to new forms of crime. Romances blossomed. Secret codes were devised
by some and cracked by others. The benefits of the network were
relentlessly hyped by its advocates and dismissed by the sceptics.
Governments and regulators tried and failed to control the new medium
and attitudes to everything from news gathering to diplomacy had to be
completely rethought.

21. Over the course of a few years a new communications technology
annihilated distance and shrank the world faster and further than ever
before. A world wide communications network whose cables spanned
continents and oceans, it revolutionised business practice and gave rise
to new forms of crime. Romances blossomed. Secret codes were devised
by some and cracked by others. The benefits of the network were
relentlessly hyped by its advocates and dismissed by the sceptics.
Governments and regulators tried and failed to control the new medium
and attitudes to everything from news gathering to diplomacy had to be
completely rethought.
The telegraph, mid 1840s (Standage, 1998)
.

22. Technology is socially constructed
• Technological determinism: T drives history NO!
• Technology is neutral: effects depend on chosen use (“guns
don’t kill people, people do”) NO!
• Technology is socially constructed:
–The technology could have been otherwise
–All technologies embody social and political contingency e.g.
design decisions reflect social, political, economic circumstances
–Artefacts have politics; politics are inscribed in technology so that
technology appears neutral.
–What we think are choices are actually responses to a socially and
politically impregnated technology