Crisis: institutions and communication

To my comrades and me, the recent Financial Crisis has brought such chaos that the stability of society as a whole seems suddenly in question. In a wave of fear, confusion and lies, the value of stock in once prestigious financial institutions has plummeted, promises from banks long considered beyond reliable have defaulted, and the words of authority hitherto taken for granted have been proven false. To a group of college students already critical of modern western capitalist thinking, this crisis in New York and in Washington has adopted the long heralded image of revolution. With the strongest economic powers, the owners of the very capital that powers production, seeming to collapse upon their own foundations, traditional thinking has fallen apart.

While I do not realistically claim that the modern capitalist system is headed for an inevitable decline, I suggest that a new paradigm in social analysis might help to explain phenomena that classical economics fails to notice. It is my belief that the cause of instability like the current Financial Crisis lies not in any single policy decision, bureaucratic loophole, or business model. Each of these might explain the behavior of a single actor in the economic system. Laws, policies and plans can certainly change segments of our system. However, as modern means of communication, organization and commerce take an increasing precedence in our economic and social lives, the actions of single institutions are decreasing in relevance. The impact of electronic technology has made the relations of production and consumption so complex that these become sort of null terms: any attempt to break the system into production and consumption seems into actors fails at the onset. As our relations of production and consumption have grown in complexity, the old divisions – the divisions of labor and the divisions of consumer – turn upon themselves.

In a system so complex and interconnected that it cannot be separated into pieces, it is only the routes of communication – the language, voice and reasoning that informs economic decision making – that can lead to a cohesive description of current events. What is necessary is a communicative theory of economics, politics and society. What we need to do is measure the exchange of information, explain actions by the connections between their actors, and listen to the general tune of modern life. In the age of networks and global communication, we are uniquely able to connect with the human element of society. As communicators, we are all on an equal footing. The traditional power structures that separated rich from poor, elite from the masses, and even man from state collapse when we are all speakers.

Though the ultimate objectification, modern network life has given a net by which we can elevate ourselves above the material world. Only through an understanding of communication can we seize our liberation.