All: Techno-economics & SW Political Theory

Gentlesophonts:

Here's a second try at this post:

Hans Rancke [email removed] writes:

> >>economic instability _should_ result in TL instability.
> >
> >Why? This is what I'm having difficulty with.
>
> Is the difficulty with the fact that there are no examples, or is it the
> very concept you can't accept?

It's the very concept.  I accept that some technological variations might
be tied to economic fluctuations but I have great difficulty with the idea
that overall technological capability (what TL measures) is going to vary
much unless there are *huge* fluctuations in the economy, i.e. the Long
Night or Viral Collapse.

The examples you cited are fine but they only refer to individual firms.
For the techno-economic cycles to occur they have to affect entire
industries.  A particular Gram jump drive manufacturer might get a `jump'
on a particular Sacnoth jump drive manufacturer but for the techno-
economics theory to hold *several* Gram industries (ship building, medical
tech, communications, robotics, *et al*) would have to `get a jump' on
similar industries on Sacnoth.  This really seems to be a stretch of the
imagination to me.  I'll admit it's possible but it's not very darn likely.

> (Btw. there's another, perfectly simple, explanation of how Gram could be

> only TL 10-11 in other, vital areas (Check _World Builder's Handbook_ for
> details).)

Yes, I'm aware of *WBH* but while this might explain a particular circumstance
it doesn't explain the subsector-wide situation.  Gram might have higher
space tech than Sacnoth but by the same reasoning Narsil might have higher
space tech than both.  This just leads to ever-more-insidious possibilities.

> How many worlds do we have any historical data on? A mere handful. While an
> example might prove my point, the absence dosen't disprove it (since I'm
> merely trying to establish that it could happen).

Wait a minute!  This is the same `reasoning' UFO-nuts use to make claims
about ET visitors.  It is the burden of any claimant to provide evidence
of their claim.  Merely suggesting that your argument can't be disproved does
not make your point!

> Do you really think that no contemporary of Piper wrote about social
> systems with more equal treatment of men and women than his Sword Worlds?

Certainly there were more `progressive' contemporaries of Piper but he was
consistent with the general attitudes of his period.

> Or that TCS couldn't have gotten away with describing a minor, antagonistic
> power as far more repressive than they did?

Certainly they could have but I believe they were copying Piper wholeheartedly
and were merely `updating' to fit the general attitudes of their own time.
They certainly intended for folks to `play' Sword Worlders and so didn't
want them to be too repressive (like the Solomani which were never featured
as anything but `bad guys' until *Solomani and Aslan*).

> >>I despair of explaining those cycles any better than by the sentence
> >>'Economy can (and often does) fluctuate'.
> >
> >I *get* the *economic* fluctuation, what I don't get is how *technological*
> >ability gets tied to it!
>
> Because if technology wasn't tied to economic features then most every
> world in Charted Space would be TL 15! (Except those with religious or
> philosophically induced limits.)

We seem to go back and forth on this.  I accept that technological
achievement (TL) is tied to economic capability.  What I don't accept
is that fluctuations in the economy (relatively minor in the overall scheme
of things) are reflected in *fluctuations* in technological achievement
(a relatively major event).  Again, why the need to propose this in the
absence of *any* evidence of a downward technological `fluctuation'?

> Except that they represent a stagnation of the economy that is quite
> incredible to me. It's the 'slow' I object to. One TL in umpteen centuries
> is not slow, it's moribund.

Okay, but who's feelings are competing with the factual record now?

> Right. I will give you those decades. I'll even make them centuries. So the
> question becomes: Regina was TL 9 in 275. Why did Regina gain only one TL in
> EIGHT centuries and two more in two decades?

I don't know but nothing about this slow rate of advancement calls out for
your mysterious techno-economic cycles.  I might suggest that this problem
arises from our own limited contemporary experience in which GDW has tied
technological achievement of several tech levels (TL ~5-8) to a chronological
period that only spans a single lifetime.

> Piper's Gram is merely a feudal monarchy set in a more technological
> advanced age than the medieval feudal monarchies of Terra.

Not true.  Gorram Shipyards was an industrial fief, not a land fief.  There
was also banking fief.  A feudal technocracy works similar to the feudal
aristocracy we are more familiar with.  The difference is that the medieval
feudal arstocracy was tied to land fiefs as you describe while a feudal
technocracy is tied to industrial and service fiefs that exist in `modern'
society.

> In a feudal society a vassal's ability to disregard the dictates of his
> liege lord is no greater. His whole right to his fief is tied up with his
> obligation to obey his liege lord's legitimate orders.

We all know these obligations were often ignored and `legitmacy' often
fell to the most charismatic or otherwise powerful liege lord.  This is
the whole basis of the Arturian legend.  Uther Pendragon lost his kingship
as his vassals rebelled or refused to support him.  Arthur regained that
kingship by uniting those vassals in the Fellowship of the Round Table.

> It only just struck me, but why are you assuming that there are any share-
> holders? I repeat: "By analogy a feudal technocracy is one where the King
> theoretically owns all the industry (the source of power analogous to land
> in a feudal society) and lends it out in exchange for support."

No.  A feudal technocracy is a system of government where the owners of
industrial production give their support in exchange for economic opportunity
or `protection'.  A medieval baron pledged his knights and a portion of
his economic wealth to his liege.  In return, the liege-holder (ulitmately a
king) agreed to use the combined strength of all of his barons to protect
each fiefdom from assault or other danger (like internal strife).  Similarly,
in a feudal technocracy like the *kieritsu*, the owners of industrial
production pledge their economic support (i.e. cooperation) to a central
authority which cooridinates the efforts of various industrial and service
sectors towards the perceived common good, namely profits.  This is a
voluntary arrangement where the individual corporate entities may or may not
choose to continue to cooperate.  Just as feudal barons might choose to
no longer support their liege and often did just that when they perceived
an advantage for themselves.

> Who owns the corporation in a corporate government? Who owns it in a feudal
> technocracy? What's the difference?

In a corporate government there are a single group of shareholders as
represented by the corporate board of directors.  This board acts in essence
as a single entity.  In a feudal technocracy there are several *different*
and independent groups of shareholders (i.e. the `barons') who each act
as *separate* and distinct entities.

> I think it would be useful to agree on the equivalences of various terms
> in the three systems we're talking about.

I don't think it's appropriate at all to discuss a corporate model
here.  A corporate government is a specialized form of an autocracy.  In
a corporate model there is, in theory at least, no imput at all from those
participating in the system.  You just do what the boss says or you're fired.
I'll focus my comments on the comparison of feudal aristocracy and feudal
technocracy and try to point out where the corporate model isn't relevant
as appropriate.

> Traditional feudal society	Corporation		Feudal technocracy
>
> King				     -			King

*ditto*                             *CEO*               *ditto*

> The king is the man who owns the fiefs and doles them out in return for
> support from his vassals.

This isn't correct.  In a feudal aristocracy the king does not `own' the
land.  Rather the king supplies `coordinated services' (i.e. joint military
protection) in return for `cooperation' from his vassals (i.e. local military
forces and tax revenue).

> In that respect he is the equivalent of the
> owner or the shareholders of a corporation. But an owner's power does not
> depend on the support of their CEOs, so there is no real correspondence.

No, the king is the equivalent of the Chairman of the Board of Directors.
The Chairman provides `coordinated activites', i.e. `running the company'
in return for the financial support of the shareholders, i.e. `cooperation'.
A true feudal technocracy is much more complicated than this because it
concerns *all* of the shareholders of *all* of the industrial and service
entities acting in the entire marketplace.  In this sense, if there is a
`king' he has gained monopoly control of the entire economic sytem.  This
is why US industry fears the Japanese *kieritsu* so much.  They are concerned
that their coordinated activity gives Japanese industry a competitive
advantage.

>  Fief				Corporation		Corporation

*ditto*              no equivalent autonomous unit      Block of Shares

> Vassal (Duke/Count/etc.)	CEO			Vassal

*ditto*                       not applicable            *ditto*

> The vassal manages the fief for the king.

No, the vassal agrees to put the resources of the fief at the disposal of
the king in exchange for centrally-coordinated joint services.

> Steward/Reeve/Guard Captain	Company Officer		Company Officer

*ditto*                       again not applicable      *ditto*

> Sub-fief			Subsidiary		Subsidiary

*ditto*                       again not applicable      *ditto*

> Feudal service			Dividend	Feudal service

*ditto*                       again not applicable      *cash* (in exchange
                                                        for `shares' of the
                                                        profits)

> In a feudal society a vassal pays his liege lord with service, not with
> money. Shareholders, on the other hand, recieve their pay in money.

No, the dividends received by shareholders in a feudal technocracy are
equivalent to the military protection received by fiefholders in a feudal
aristocracy.

>      -				Board of Directors	     -
>      -				Shareholders		     -
>
> These have no real equivalents in a feudal society.

No, *shareholders* are the equivalent of *fiefholders*.  Each block of
shareholders, represented by their boards of directors, is equivalent to
the fiefholders of a feudal aristocracy.  Each block of shares is a fief.

> >In a feudal technocracy the `king' owns the largest bloc of shares of
> >*everything* but he doesn't necessarily own everything.
>
> You didn't get this from Piper. Duke Angus owns his holdings outright. Baron
> Trask owns all of Traskon. Baron Karvall owns all of Karvall. When Lucas
> Trask pledges Traskon in return for a ship, Angus gets the whole bit, not
> just a share of it.

There's no conflict here!  Trask could have sold only a portion of Traskon.
He owned that entire block of shares of the total economic sector of Gram.
Remember, it was partially because of the greater economic power he gained
from the acquisition of Traskon that *Duke* Angus eventually became *King*
Angus.  Traskon Barony increased Angus's share of the total economic output
(GPP?) of Gram and thereby led to him becoming king by virtue of his control
of the largest portion of the entire economy.

> >If no one owns a
> >controlling bloc you get balkanization, like Joyeuse.
>
> If the Dukes can't agree on who to support for king you get balkanization.

Right.  And in a feudal technocracy, `dukes' are merely those who control
large blocks of industrial production - shareholders.

> Still sounds like corporate politics. I don't see where the feudal bit gets
> into it at all. The Chairman of a Corporation dosen't excersise _any_
> control over the pension funds, does he?

Yes, he provides coordinated control of the combined assets of shareholders
(like the pension funds) in an effort to produce profits and hence dividends
or increased stock value for the shareholders.  This is just like the feudal
aristocratic model where the king provides coordinated control of the
combined resources of fiefholders in an effort to produce security.

> The pension fund managers dosen't
> perform services for the Corporation Chairman, do they (They don't even
> pay him money).

*Au contraire*!  The pension funds and other shareholders provide *cash*
to the chairman just as aristocratic vassals provided military forces and
tax revenue to the king.

> Thus there is no true equivalence between the pension fund
> managers and a fiefholder in a feudal society.

It is *exactly* the same.

> I realize that I assume that the word 'feudal' in 'feudal technocracy' has a
> semantic content close to the normal definition of the word

So do I.

> >The key element here is that in a feudal technocracy the economic influence
> >of shareholders translates directly into politcal power.
>
> In a feudal technocracy industrial holdings IMO takes the place of land for
> the purposes of generating the wealth that translates into power.

We're saying the same thing.  If the technocratic baron chooses to place
his support in the hands of a different lord he transfers not only economic
power but political power as well.

> If he owns them he can dictate who gets to buy them.

He doesn't own them just as an aristocratic king didn't own his vassals'
fiefs.  If Uther Pendragon had `owned' the fief of Cornwall he could have
just `removed' the Duke and taken his wife Igrayne.  Instead he was forced
to lay seige to Cornwall when the Duke no longer chose to support him.

> Why? We are talking about the GDW Sword Worlds, aren't we? Why invite
> confusion?

Okay, okay.  It's King Anders then.

> Thereby forfeiting his right to the fief.

No, thereby forfeiting his right to protection from the aristocratic king
or profits from the technocratic king.

> >My point is that since, under my world view, Sacnoth is the strongest
> >economic power, Harald will one day triumph over Angus.
>
> 1) Being stronger is not an automatic ticket to victory.

It is in a feudal technocracy.  Again, it's why US industry fears the
Japanese.

> 2) He isn't that much stronger.

He is if he really enjoys a full tech level advantage.  (Of course, you
must give up your `cycles' to accept this point.)

>    King Anders could own huge blocks of Sacnoth industry, making
>    Harald a puppet of his.

Yes, he might except that the TL 12 vassals on Sacnoth might choose to
no longer support Anders (since their TL 12 industry ought to be better
able to compete *against* Anders's TL 11 holdings on Gram) and so they
would strive for their own competitive advantage and thus greater politcal
power.  Eventually, some Sacnoth vassal of Anders's would rise to a
position of dominance on Sacnoth as King Thorvald or whomever.

> If Anders owns all of Gram he will have to put people in charge of parts of
> it, which could result in various systems, including a feudal technocracy.

No, if Anders of placing people in control then they enjoy their control
*at his whim*.  This is not a feudal arrangement at all.  It is autocracy
*and* similar *then* to the corporate model.

> Again you assume that Harald and his ancestors would want to conquer Gram
> militarily. Again I suggest that they may not be ready to pay the price.

No, I'm just assuming that a little military action might make the economic
conquest of Gram a little simpler.  Think of Japan with a full tech level
advantage, a nuclear arsenal and the ability to project global military force.
There'd be no `voluntary' import restrictions on Japanese autos in the US in
that scenario!

Peace,

David Johnson
Houston, Texas, USA