Humane Scheme.

Jay Springett, Who owns the means of not dying?, 2013.

But instead of being confined to a resentment that destroys life in the act of hurling defiance, we can now act directly on the nature of the machine itself, and create another race of these creatures, more effectively adapted to the environment and to the uses of life. At this point, one must go beyond Sombart's so far excellent analysis. Sombart pointed out, in a long list of contrasting productions and inventions, that the clue to modern technology was the displacement of the organic and the living by the artificial and the mechanical. Within technology itself this process, in many departments, is being reversed: we are returning to the organic: at all events, we no longer regard the mechanical as all-embracing and all-sufficient.

Once the organic image takes the place of the mechanical one, one may confidently predict a slowing down of the tempo of research, the tempo of mechanical invention, and the tempo of social change, since a coherent and integrated advance must take place more slowly than a one-sided unrelated advance. Whereas the earlier mechanical world could be represented by the game of checkers, in which a similar series of moves is carried out by identical pieces, qualitatively similar, the new world must be represented by chess, a game in which each order of pieces has a different status, a different value, and a different function: a slower and more exacting game. By the same token, however, the results in technology and in society will be of a more solid nature than those upon which paleotechnic science congratulated itself: for the truth is that every aspect of the earlier order, from the slums in which it housed its workers and to the towers of abstraction in which it housed its intellectuals, was jerrybuilt - hastily clapped together for the sake of immediate profits, immediate practical success, with no regard to wider consequences and implications. The emphasis in the future must be, not upon speed and immediate practical conquest, but upon exhaustiveness, inter-relationship, and integration. The co-ordination of our technical efforts - such co-ordination and adjustment as is pictured for us in the physiology of the living organism - is more important than extravagant advances along special lines, and equally extravagant retardations along other lines, with a disastrous lack of balance and harmony between the various parts.

The fact is then that, partly thanks to the machine, we have now an insight into a larger world and a more comprehensive intellectual synthesis than that which was originally outlined in our mechanical ideology. We can now see plainly that power, work, regularity, are adequate principles of action only when they cooperate with a humane scheme of living: that any mechanical order we can project must fit into the larger order of life itself. Beyond the necessary intellectual reconstruction, which is already going on in both science and technics, we must build up more organic centers of faith and action in the arts of society and in the discipline of the personality: this implies a re-orientation that will take us far beyond the immediate province of technics itself.

Lewis Mumford, Towards an Organic Ideology in Rethinking Technology, A Reader in Architectural Theory, Routledge, 1934 (2013), p.57.

Technical Steps.

Professor Bourbaki, IMG_0291, 2013.

Local practices form the place of origin of novelty and new technical knowledge. New technologies emerge as small technical steps in response to local problems, and only later give rise to new technical trajectories. Thus, both new artefacts and knowledge emerge through localised work. But local technical knowledge does not simply flow to other locations, as if it were a discrete entity. Before knowledge can circulate, it has to be made sufficiently context-free. (…) To create generic knowledge that can circulate, dedicated socio-cognitive work is needed to bring about a process of aggregation. “Aggregation” is the process of transforming local knowledge into robust knowledge, which is sufficiently general, abstracted and packaged, so that it is no longer tied to specific contexts. (…) 

Typical aggregation activities include standardisation, model building, writing of handbooks, formulation of best practices. Also codification, a term used by economists to describe the transformation of tacit into codified knowledge, is part of aggregation. (…) 

Codification means recording in a “codebook” and involves model building, language creation and message writing. While codification highlights the “coding” aspect of dynamics, aggregation also emphasises the “de-localisation” aspect. Aggregation refers to a broader socio-cognitive process of which codification is an aspect. 

Aggregation entails the production of a collective good: abstract knowledge that can be used by others. Because of free-rider problems, participation in aggregation processes is not self-evident. Why would you contribute to the build-up of a collective knowledge reservoir and share experiences with others, especially when they are competitors? Without proper arrangements or incentive structures, such collective goods will not be produced optimally, because they can be used by others who have not contributed to its production (Deuten, 2003). An important arrangement is the creation of intermediary actors, for example, professional societies, industry associations, standardisation organisations. Such intermediary actors may be created when actors perceive themselves as part of an emerging community with collective interests. In that case, perceived benefits of producing a collective good may outweigh perceived disadvantages. 

Intermediary actors may perform aggregation activities, because they have special responsibilities and roles. Standardisation organisations, for instance, are responsible for creating and maintaining a collective reservoir of (standardised) technical knowledge (Schmidt and Werle, 1998). Professional societies and industry associations also stimulate and facilitate the production and circulation of technical knowledge. They may create technical standards, articulate problem agendas, and exchange experiences and findings to further the interests of the (emergent) field as a whole. Also firms that travel between local practices may aggregate knowledge. Engineering firms or sector research institutes, for instance, are hired by other firms to perform certain jobs. They can compare experiences in different locations, reflect on differences and draw general conclusions. They can use this aggregated knowledge for other jobs in different locations. Initially, they may aggregate their experiences for intra-organisational purposes only. But they may also be willing to share (parts of) their knowledge reservoirs to enhance their reputation and visibility in relevant forums. 

Aggregation activities by intermediary actors do not revolve around finding technological solutions for local, specific problems, but rather around the creation, maintenance and distribution of generic, abstracted knowledge that can be used throughout a technological field (Rip, 1997; Deuten, 2003). So there is a division of cognitive labour: practical technical work in local practices, and dedicated aggregation activities to transform local experiences into global knowledge. Intermediary actors work at this global level. Intermediary actors are not always present from the start. They are often created as part of the emergence of a new technical community. Also the creation of an infrastructure for circulation and aggregation processes is important. Such an infrastructure consists of forums that enable (and induce) the gathering and interaction of actors, the exchange of experiences and the organisation of collective action. Examples of such forums are conferences, seminars, workshops, technical journals, proceedings, and so on. The creation of these forums tends to be part of community formation processes.

F. Geels and J. J. Deuten, “Local and global dynamics in technological development: a socio-cognitive perspective on knowledge flows and lessons from reinforced concrete,” Sci. Public Policy, vol. 33, no. 4, pp. 265–275, May 2006.

Innovation Regime.

Professor Bourbaki, IMG_0510, 2013.

 
Markets as Techno-economic Networks of Interactive/Strategic (Economizing) Agents. The new innovation regime outlined earlier is attended by a change in the forms of organization of economic activity. This change consists of two contradictory trends: the creation of collectives in which distributed actions are deployed, and the strengthening of individual agencies considered to be sources of the action.

First, the new innovation regime accentuates the collective dimension of the innovation process. Demands for singularization, assemblage, socialization, reactivity and adaptation imply the participation of countless groups of diversified and heterogeneous actors. The most noteworthy are researchers who work in public or semi-public laboratories, consumers or users – actors as individuals or as organized groups – all the professionals of commercialization of products, subcontracting firms or allies, government authorities that regulate, and civil society.

The notion of an innovation network aptly describes this form of market organization. It is a question of saying, not that any market can be analysed as a network, as in the new economic sociology, but rather that markets are explicitly organized in the form of networks which allow the coordination of a large number of heterogeneous actors who define one another through the circulation of intermediaries. To denote this type of organization I have proposed the term techno-economic networks (Callon, 1992). I will therefore refer to it as “Markets as TEN” (or, interchangeably, markets as networks of innovation).

Markets as TEN have often been described: plunging into the academic world, linking up firms to one another, mobilizing a host of professions that commercialize innovations, relying on government administrations or public agencies and, finally, enrolling consumers or customers to whom these innovations are proposed and who readily become attached to them (DeBresson and Amesse, 1991; Powell et al., 1996). These networks are dynamic; they can be reconfigured, depending on what alliances are mobilized, what innovations are designed and which customers are to be captured. When consumers hesitate between two cars, two fruit juices or two package holidays proposed by tour operators, they see only the offer being made to them. But that offer is simply the extremity of a deep, extensive and diversified network that has been mobilized for that particular offer, which differs from others. If they turn the page of the catalogue or prefer Nissan to Toyota, they are trading off one network against another. The collective process of designing innovations, organizing production and soliciting customers increasingly involves competition between networks with evolving configurations.

The second characteristic of the innovation regime which eventually prevails and favours forms of collective (interactive) organizations, is the fact that this regime also, simultaneously and in a contradictory way, favours the appearance and dissemination of new forms of economic agency that accentuate the influence of individualism in economic life.

To describe this evolution of economic agencies, it is convenient to distinguish, in a very sketchy provisional way, between successive versions of economizing agents – or, if one prefers, of Homo economicus: the first version, or version 1.0, corresponds to the Taylorist world of production and consumption already mentioned; the second, version 2.0, to an interactive world in which the network and the project become dominant. The Taylorist version of economizing agents is well known. It denotes individual agents whose behavioural norms are set by others (heteronomy), in a world where strict discipline is imposed, and actions and interactions are planned. This model applies equally to the world of production and to that of consumption. With the interactive model, clearly described by Andrew Barry, Homo economicus opens up and becomes autonomous (Barry, 2001). Whether he is a producer or a consumer, he is prompted to develop projects, to take initiatives, to interact with his environment in order to reorient his actions, and to play strategic games. Finally, he is accountable for what he does. Both cases concern the same anthropological model focused on an individual who calculates his interests and optimizes his behaviours and choices. But from one model to the next the competencies have changed; some would say they have been enhanced. Homo economicus 2.0 is caught up in a logic of constant innovation; he is summoned to innovate. Boltanski and Chiapello (2006) have suggested that the notion of a project was at the heart of this new economic configuration: it links the collective dimension of innovation (the project group) to its individual dimension (Homo economicus 2.0). This growing importance of the interactive diagram applies as much to consumption (Von Hippel, 2004) as it does to production. Techno-economic networks are networks of interactive autonomous innovative agencies.

This new form of market organization is leading to more and more overflowings and to a stronger framing process. This tendency is accentuated by changes in the content of the technosciences, which we will examine for each of the sources of matters of concern. 

M. Callon, “An Essay on the Growing Contribution of Economic Markets to the Proliferation of the Social,” Theory Cult. Soc., vol. 24, no. 7–8, pp. 139–163, Dec. 2007.

Objet Technique.

Gilbert Simondon, Entretien sur la Mécanologie, 1968.

Jean-Yves Chateau a raison de le rappeler dans la longue introduction qui ouvre ce recueil : le souci de l’invention, chez Simondon, n’est pas une manière de dramatiser l’histoire des techniques, c’est une véritable méthode de recherche et d’analyse - mieux, un critère de ce qui est proprement technique, de ce qui fait de la technique "un ordre original de réalité" (p. 14). Aussi l’invention dans le domaine des techniques ne relève-t-elle pas à proprement parler d’une investigation psychologique "au sens habituel du terme", comme le précise Simondon (p. 332). Elle ne se confond pas avec la "créativité" de l’inventeur au travail ; elle ne peut apparaître que rétrospectivement, dans les gestes matérialisés, stabilisés en procédés, dans les objets inventés et les indices matériels de leur élaboration (schémas, prototypes, etc.). On ne lit pas à livre ouvert dans l’esprit des inventeurs : l’esprit est une boîte noire. Qu’il s’agisse du fil à couper le beurre ou de la turbine Guimbal, l’invention doit se lire dans les "traces". La psychologie de l’invention technique suppose donc une forme d’archéologie, et le sujet de l’invention, qu’il soit individuel ou collectif, laborieux ou génial, est toujours un sujet reconstruit à travers ses objets - un sujet technologique plutôt que psychologique. Ainsi la psychologie se confond finalement avec une phénoménologie des objets techniques dont les chemins ne cessent de recroiser ceux de la technologie et de l’histoire des techniques. Mais elle n’est pas séparable non plus d’une ontologie qui interroge le "mode d’existence" de l’objet technique à partir de ce qui fait proprement sa technicité (6). On objectera peut-être ici qu’à moins d’être technicien ou technologue, nous n’avons quasiment jamais affaire à des "objets techniques", mais d’emblée à des ustensiles ou à des machines dont le mode d’être n’est pas séparable de modes d’emploi ou d’usages particuliers. Il y a trois manières de répondre à cela. D’abord, l’objection concède à Simondon le point essentiel, à savoir que les objets techniques n’ont pas l’évidence qu’on leur prête habituellement. À strictement parler, nous ne savons pas ce qu’est un objet technique ; nous ignorons ce qu’il y a de spécifiquement technique dans les objets artificiels dont nous usons le plus souvent sans y penser. L’objet technique est-il d’ailleurs un objet ? Les catégories ordinaires qui nous servent à déployer les modes de l’objectivité ne nous masquent-elles pas l’essentiel ? Ensuite, au niveau fondamental où Simondon prend les choses, le point de vue de la fonctionnalité ou de l’utilité nous détourne de ce qui est proprement technique. L’objet technique n’est d’ailleurs pas nécessairement un outil ou un instrument : il peut être un ustensile, ou une machine présentant des degrés de complexité variables. Or un balai, un aspirateur, peuvent bien servir tous deux à ramasser de la poussière, cet usage commun ne les rapproche pas davantage que le fait de voisiner dans un placard. Enfin, si l’outil et l’instrument remplissent en effet une fonction médiatrice, une fonction de couplage entre un organisme et son milieu, l’essentiel pourtant n’est pas dans ce couplage et les diverses fonctions qu’il remplit : fonction de prolongement (cas de la pince à long bec), fonction de transformation (bras de levier de la pince), fonction d’isolement (pince gainée). Leroi-Gourhan, parmi d’autres, a produit des descriptions et des classifications précises des formes fondamentales de la médiation opérée par l’outil. Cependant, tout reste à faire pour ce qui est d’isoler les critères de la "technicité" et de cerner la nature de l’objet technique. Car "la fonction relationnelle n’est pas la seule : même au niveau le moins élevé, les objets techniques ont une logique interne, une auto-corrélation sans laquelle ils ne pourraient exister" (p. 91).

Elie During, Simondon au Pied du Mur in Critique, 706, 2006.