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Professor Roberto Unger (Harvard) often talks about the current restlessness of the masses in his political philosophy of the paradigm of Progressive Politics c

Professor Roberto Unger (Harvard) often talks about the current restlessness of the masses in his political philosophy of the paradigm of Progressive Politics courses. Something that through listening to his lecturers over the last few years I strongly agree with. Mainly that people at this moment in time are yearning for a reimagining of what the human experience is, and the solution is a progressive political campaign reimagining our entire institutions. We see the same restlessness in the national Primary Education teacher strikes. Is it possible that the academics are the beginning of a more substantial wave of worker rights and protections as we enter the new Knowledge Economy? Edited to add website: http://www.robertounger.com/en/ http://www.robertounger.com/en/

aldoushuxley001 8y ago
What is the Knowledge Economy anyway? I hear people talk of it every now and then but don't understand what it actually is.
- cocacola1 8y ago
  According to Wikipedia: > The knowledge economy is the use of knowledge (savoir, savoir-faire, savoir-être) to generate tangible and intangible values[1]. Technology, and in particular, knowledge technology, helps to incorporate part of human knowledge into machines[2]. This knowledge can be used by decision support systems in various fields to generate economic value. Knowledge economy is also possible without technology.[3]
  - staticautomatic 8y ago
    Is it just me or is that pure jibberish?
    - andrewflnr 8y ago
      Nah, I'd say it's at most 30% gibberish. Definitely pretty abstract, though.
    - blackbagboys 8y ago
      What is programming other than a way of embedding human knowledge into machines in order to generate value?
    - cocacola1 8y ago
      I think it probably comes across that way because the term hasn't found strong footing yet.
  - Spooky23 8y ago
    In human, it’s essentially non-clerical office work.
- rrivers 8y ago
  .The Knowledge Economy is an economic system where the most advanced form of production is based on highly skilled labor that is easily transferable between organizations. Our modern example being Silicon Valley. This type of work has replaced industry/manufacturing for the title of "most advanced." Most advanced being summed as greatest returns for input. The problem we have right now as Unger argues is that this new Knowledge Economy is insular - in that it is self-contained to tech hubs. His argument for the Progressive Movement is to spread the most advanced forms of production to all sectors and the only way to accomplish that is through institutional reformation. The labor of the future will be broken into cooperative efforts and self-employment - all under a system of free labor which can now be realized and empowered by technology. He argues that no man should have to do a job a machine can do.
thaumasiotes 8y ago
> often talks about the current restlessness of the masses in his political philosophy of the paradigm of Progressive Politics courses Does this ever get abbreviated to PPPPP?
- shanghaiaway 8y ago
  It's actually abbreviated :PPPPP
refurb 8y ago
Mainly that people at this moment in time are yearning for a reimagining of what the human experience When has this desire not existed? I don't think there is anything unique about the current times.
- ggg9990 8y ago
  I think socially liberal movements have made so much progress, at least on paper, that they are running out of things to do. They went from fighting for the vote for women (50%), then Jim Crow for blacks (13%), to marriage equality for gays (2-5%), that now they are on to bathroom equality for transgender people (much less than 1%). So the intensity per oppressed person they are fighting for has to increase to satisfy the market demand for socially progressive activism. Note that the bathroom equality fight is framed in terms of transgender individuals getting “killed” which is the extreme outlier case (and even was in Jim Crow, but less so).
  - wincy 8y ago
    I’ve heard this concept referred to as the “St George the dragon slayer retirement syndrome”. https://medium.com/@sarahsjoking/st-george-the-dragon-slayer-in-retirement-syndrome-dd6ea9b61ef2 https://medium.com/@sarahsjoking/st-george-the-dragon-slayer...
  - jonnybgood 8y ago
    > They went from fighting for the vote for women (50%) Technically, more like around 30%. It only included white women. Also, Jim Crow didn’t just target blacks but all non-whites, or what was considered not white. I wouldn’t frame it as “running out of things to do”. It’s more like playing catch up to the ideals America was supposedly founded on.
  - mercer 8y ago
    I think the 'on paper' part is crucial. Rather than find new things to fight for, perhaps now is the time to double down and make that 'on paper' more real society-wide. I'm assuming it isn't, but I hope I'm wrong about that. While personally I support a lot of the even more 'forward-thinking' fights, I do think it's become more and more clear that a lot of people have difficulty accepting all those things we've made progress on, on paper. I worry about that disconnect. It's a bit like wanting to add new features when perhaps refactoring old code is the better thing to do.

aldoushuxley001 8y ago

What is the Knowledge Economy anyway? I hear people talk of it every now and then but don't understand what it actually is.

cocacola1 8y ago
According to Wikipedia: > The knowledge economy is the use of knowledge (savoir, savoir-faire, savoir-être) to generate tangible and intangible values[1]. Technology, and in particular, knowledge technology, helps to incorporate part of human knowledge into machines[2]. This knowledge can be used by decision support systems in various fields to generate economic value. Knowledge economy is also possible without technology.[3]
- staticautomatic 8y ago
  Is it just me or is that pure jibberish?
  - andrewflnr 8y ago
    Nah, I'd say it's at most 30% gibberish. Definitely pretty abstract, though.
  - blackbagboys 8y ago
    What is programming other than a way of embedding human knowledge into machines in order to generate value?
  - cocacola1 8y ago
    I think it probably comes across that way because the term hasn't found strong footing yet.
- Spooky23 8y ago
  In human, it’s essentially non-clerical office work.
rrivers 8y ago
.The Knowledge Economy is an economic system where the most advanced form of production is based on highly skilled labor that is easily transferable between organizations. Our modern example being Silicon Valley. This type of work has replaced industry/manufacturing for the title of "most advanced." Most advanced being summed as greatest returns for input. The problem we have right now as Unger argues is that this new Knowledge Economy is insular - in that it is self-contained to tech hubs. His argument for the Progressive Movement is to spread the most advanced forms of production to all sectors and the only way to accomplish that is through institutional reformation. The labor of the future will be broken into cooperative efforts and self-employment - all under a system of free labor which can now be realized and empowered by technology. He argues that no man should have to do a job a machine can do.

thaumasiotes 8y ago

> often talks about the current restlessness of the masses in his political philosophy of the paradigm of Progressive Politics courses Does this ever get abbreviated to PPPPP?

shanghaiaway 8y ago
It's actually abbreviated :PPPPP

refurb 8y ago

Mainly that people at this moment in time are yearning for a reimagining of what the human experience When has this desire not existed? I don't think there is anything unique about the current times.

ggg9990 8y ago
I think socially liberal movements have made so much progress, at least on paper, that they are running out of things to do. They went from fighting for the vote for women (50%), then Jim Crow for blacks (13%), to marriage equality for gays (2-5%), that now they are on to bathroom equality for transgender people (much less than 1%). So the intensity per oppressed person they are fighting for has to increase to satisfy the market demand for socially progressive activism. Note that the bathroom equality fight is framed in terms of transgender individuals getting “killed” which is the extreme outlier case (and even was in Jim Crow, but less so).
- wincy 8y ago
  I’ve heard this concept referred to as the “St George the dragon slayer retirement syndrome”. https://medium.com/@sarahsjoking/st-george-the-dragon-slayer-in-retirement-syndrome-dd6ea9b61ef2 https://medium.com/@sarahsjoking/st-george-the-dragon-slayer...
- jonnybgood 8y ago
  > They went from fighting for the vote for women (50%) Technically, more like around 30%. It only included white women. Also, Jim Crow didn’t just target blacks but all non-whites, or what was considered not white. I wouldn’t frame it as “running out of things to do”. It’s more like playing catch up to the ideals America was supposedly founded on.
- mercer 8y ago
  I think the 'on paper' part is crucial. Rather than find new things to fight for, perhaps now is the time to double down and make that 'on paper' more real society-wide. I'm assuming it isn't, but I hope I'm wrong about that. While personally I support a lot of the even more 'forward-thinking' fights, I do think it's become more and more clear that a lot of people have difficulty accepting all those things we've made progress on, on paper. I worry about that disconnect. It's a bit like wanting to add new features when perhaps refactoring old code is the better thing to do.