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While I agree that much of what is wrong with society boils down to a lack of civic participation and familiarity with institution-building, what I think this a
by lsy 3y ago
While I agree that much of what is wrong with society boils down to a lack of civic participation and familiarity with institution-building, what I think this article perhaps misses is that social and technological changes militate against the effectiveness of a robust civil society. As conglomerates and governments can expand their reach through communications and management technologies, it becomes more feasible for institutions to manage large jurisdictions at a distance without intermediaries. And that same ability to grow to a large size also prevents smaller organizations from arising and seeing any effectiveness in their efforts.
I also disagree that Silicon Valley represents any kind of solution to this issue. The centralization of power in the Valley is almost more extreme than in the "old world", as multinational companies dominate the industry and destroy competition. Most people will do better for themselves financially by joining the elect of the fiefdoms of FAANG than by fruitlessly attempting to build a smaller company or product, and the big companies keep it that way through massive networks of financialization and regulatory capture.
In order for civic and social institutions, or small self-built institutions, to be attractive to Americans, people who join them have to have some experience of succeeding in their aims, and I think this is less and less the case, as the institutions that already exist suck the oxygen out of the space of potential action.
- creer 3y agoSilicon Valley is (still) an example of vitality. You don't have to join small companies as a founder or for more than a reasonably well paying job. You don't have to be part of the few who will rack their brains trying to find ways to sneak in between the FAANGs. Civic participation, by constrast, is difficult because it runs into the giant morass of public institutions laws and rules. Well serving the political forces in places but again not much to do with the FAANGs. (For example, while the city of Mountain View professes its pride in Google, it fights everything that Google wants to do inch by inch. Google doesn't exactly find much "proud cooperation" with its city.)
- throwaway626 3y ago[dead]
- 082349872349872 3y agoIt took emigration to another country for me to first experience the web of overlapping voluntary associations as a basis for town life which Tocqueville had noted when describing (an earlier instantiation of) the Old Country in Democracy in America (1835).
- MichaelZuo 3y ago> Most people will do better for themselves financially by joining the elect of the fiefdoms of FAANG than by fruitlessly attempting to build a smaller company or product... Perhaps, but not for actual, bonafide, geniuses and super-geniuses. Which is more than enough, it's not like having hundreds of challengers instead of dozens is 10x better, there's rapidly diminishing returns for society past the first few bonafide, competent, institutional challengers. It might even be net negative beyond a small amount.