Power and Social Control

Extract

Human culture develops as a means for man to control his environment. Primitive cultures rely to a large extent on magical means. The whimiscal and incalculable forces which govern nature are personified, and rituals are developed which are intended to control the actions of the gods. Such cultures tend to be fatalistic. The magical controls are limited and uncertain. One must endure and accept what comes.

As culture develops, men turn increasingly to rational control of the environment. Technology arises, and, what is more fundamental, attitudes arise which enable the progressive development and utilization of technological resources. In our culture, full rational control over the environment appears not far from accomplishment.

As the forces of nature give way to the development of culture, however, it becomes evident that the culture itself exhibits “forces” or “laws of development” which seem themselves to be beyond control. It has become a commonplace to say that while man has established rational control over nature, he has not done so over his culture, and that this is the next and imperative task. What is too commonly overlooked is the radically different nature of the second problem.

It is through culture that rational control of nature is possible. By analogy, it would seem that culture itself must supply the resources to control itself: that is, that rational control over culture must in some sense be reflexive. This raises a set of problems that, even after two thousand years, have not as yet been thought through. The methods and techniques used to control nature may have to be profoundly transformed before they can be used to subject culture to rational control—indeed, the very meaning of the term “rational control” is called into question.