“It is useful to summarise some of the key differences between the two visions of post-industrial society, keeping in mind that the liberal “limits-to-growth” position lies somewhere in between, employing much or the ecological, post-materialistic rhetoric of the decentralists while maintaining the assumptions of the service society.
- Who holds what position? Advocates of the service society arc virtually all social scientists (particularly those who are successful in conventional terms), and a few Marxist historians and social reformers. Those favouring decentralisation often have an intellectual background in the humanities, although, increasingly, they are joined by ecologists. There are no survey data, but there would probably be little correlation with social class and income, and a strong correlation with location in urban or rural areas and with the degree of affiliation with large institutions.
- Methods employed. Service society advocates promulgate their views as objective forecasts and often use various quantitative methodologies; decentralists speak openly of their values and stress “alternatives” or “alternative futures”.
- Key concepts. Service society advocates claim general progress in recent years involving more affluence, leisure, urbanisation, state intervention, effective use of intellectual technology, and growth of the new class of professional elites. Decentralists regard further industrialism as unworkable. GNP as an obsolete and misleading measure, the economy as on the brink of collapse, state intervention as inept or onerous, technocrats as ignorant of the real world, and self-sufficiency as the good life.
- Attitude toward technology. Service society advocates view technological growth as inevitable; if it has caused problems, only new technology can solve them, and technology assessment can prohibit or restrict undesirable developments. Decentralists hail intermediate, small, appropriate or convivial technologies, which cost less and can be used and understood by most people.
- Ultimate future. Service society advocates see the inevitability of bureaucracy, growing interdependence in the national and global community, and the impossibility of returning to a more agrarian society. Decentralists stress self-help and independence in small local communities, and the necessity and desirability of returning, to some degree, to an agrarian life.
- View of opposing position. Service society advocates ignore decentralists or see them as nihilistic, romantic, anti-science, anti-progress, ineffective, utopian, and moralistic. Decentralists view their opponents as amoral technocrats, elitist experts, reductionists, middle class welfare careerists, and the tools of big government, big business, and big labor.
In an unguarded moment, Alvin Toffler described the contrast as “people of the future” versus “people of the present” and “people of the past”. On the other side, E. F. Schumacher distinguishes between “people of the forward stampede” and “the homecomers” who seek to return to certain basic truths about man and his world”. The Mother Earth News hints at an even simpler pair of labels: the difference between “Playboy” and “Plowboy”.
There is little problem in viewing the decentralist or eco-agrarian view as an ideology, a system of beliefs, or, as described by Daniel Bell, a “secular religion”. But Bell’s definition of ideology insists that it must be accompanied by passion, a definition that comfortably shields the covert ideology of the proponents of the scientific service society.
A careful reading of Bell’s cumbersome opus. The Coming of Post-Industrial Society: A Venture in Social Forecasting (which is more accurately seen as a venture in welfare-state ideology) will reveal a great number of statements that promote science, technology, and professionalism in their present forms. For example, the emerging ethos of post-industrial society is seen as the ethos of science; the technocratic mode is seen as the mode of efficiency—of getting things done; it is predicted that there will be more social-mindedness in the professions; and the norms of professionalism are described as the norms of the new intelligentsia, departing from the prevailing norms of economic self-interest
Professionalism flourishes in a welfare state of abundant services, and new
concepts of property prevail, the most pervasive manifestation being a new definition of social rights, as claims on the community to ensure equality of treatment (the most important right being that of full access to education). Bell sees the politics of the future as a concern of the communal society. The argument advanced in the present article is that the predominant characteristic of the politics of the future will be the conflict of views surrounding the very notion of a communal society.
Finally, Bell fires a broadside at the non-scientists:
“In the social structure of the knowledge society, there is for example, the deep and growing split between the technical intelligentsia who are committed to functional rationality and technocratic modes of operation, and the literary intellectuals, who have become increasingly apocalyptic, hedonistic, and nihilistic.”
“This division is no doubt aggravated by such a characterisation, and by the recurring tacit suggestion that the knowledge of science and technology is the only knowledge that matters.”
At present, the vision of the service society is still the dominant vision of post-industrial society. But it has been severely weakened in this decade by the environmental crisis, the energy crisis, and the economic recession. The threats of pollution have added new and unexpected costs to the production of food and material goods, aiding the arguments of those who advocate organic agriculture. The energy crisis has made us deeply aware of our finite resources and has also supported the argument for less wasteful methods of production. Finally, the unanticipated economic difficulties have made expansion of the service sector far more difficult, at least for the near future.
If the energy crisis is effectively solved by the emergence of some low-cost technology or technologies, the sense of unbounded affluence might return; there would then be ample wealth for expanding the service sector. But continuing economic difficulties would favour decentralisation and the promulgation of a greater degree of self-sufficiency.
Apart from the fortunes of the economy, another major factor in the future of decentralisation is the ineffectiveness of the decentralists in presenting their arguments. The advocates of a service society have a strong political voice and are well established in the academic world and in think-tanks, which are seen as the key institutions of the projected society. Advocates of the decentralist view, on the other hand, tend to be involved in small organisations, not, appropriately enough, in large institutions.
The result in the USA is an unequal contest between institutional Goliaths with short names, like Brookings, Harvard, Rand, and the Urban Institute, and little Davids with long names, such as the Institute for Liberty and Community, the International Independence Institute, the Institute for Self-Reliance, and the Princeton Center for Alternative Futures. Moreover, many decentralists are apolitical, tending to work in their gardens or to organise do-it-yourself co-ops, rather than to press their demands on government or engage in policy debates. Indeed, for anyone who regards government assistance as inept or corrupting, it would be inappropriate to do so. And in that many decentralists lack the credentials and conceptual tools to debate with the technocratic elites, they are excluded from, and/or exclude themselves from, serious discussions of economic and social policy. Finally, the decentralist argument tends to be excessively romantic, with back-to-the-earth visions of the independent good life or communal experimentation proposed as the solution to many or our urban ills. The vision, of the service society, however, arc seldom seen as romantic because they are issued by experts, in a reasonably sober style.
Despite these severe handicaps, the decentralist position in the 1970s is gaining strength. The major battleground in the near future may well be in agriculture, where the reigning forces of high-technology, capital-intensive, chemical agriculture may be effectively challenged by the eco-agrarian forces, which advocate small-scale organic agriculture—to conserve energy, produce more some wholesome food, reinvigorate rural communities, and provide jobs.”