the first week of trump's re-election can only be chronicled as an onslaught of absurd department head picks, the initial wave of which i experienced in real time from a hotel room in milan, where i watched CNN live for the first time in my life. the next day, back in canada, i was hit with the news that the Great Elon Musk would be co-leading the newly-formed Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) alongside American Patriot Vivek Ramaswamy. i received this update via famously unproblematic and independent social media application twitter.org, where i've been spending much of my free time since recently (and reluctantly) breaking a years-long hiatus. i suppose if i'm using the his platform, i might as well criticize him on it... am i absolved of moral failing yet? [1]
it may startle (or comfort) readers to know that i began my academic career as an Econ major, where i became semi-well-versed in the language of neoclassical economics: rational actors making self-interested decisions, the invisible hand guiding perfectly competitive markets to eventual equilibria, the Natural laws of supply and demand, etc. etc. while i did not graduate with a degree in economics, i've come to appreciate my brief stint as an economist for giving me a glimpse into the very influential ideas moving capitalism forward today. above all, studying the logic of Efficiency and Optimization allowed me to understand just how fake and flimsy all of the theory underpinning our global economic system truly is.
for example, a popular concept espoused in econ classes is the idea that inefficiency of any kind must be minimized, and ideally removed altogether. the principle of deadweight loss preaches that society incurs some sort of cost when supply and demand are out of equilibrium, leading to an inefficient allocation of resources. this principle has justified tax cuts for the highest-earning individuals and rollbacks in government spending on social welfare programs on the basis of greater efficiency. indeed, DOGE promises to "slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies" in addition to creating an "entrepreneurial approach to Government never seen before" [2]. great news for libertarian techno-capitalists but bad news for literally anyone else.
the reason for establishing a department of so-called efficiency with 2 people running it is simply 'more efficiency and less bureaucracy'. nevermind that the assumptions underlying the principle of deadweight loss (ie. humans are rational, logical, self-interested utility-maximizers) are not to true to reality, and that any economic model is merely a simulation of a simulation of the world. despite it all, efficiency has become naturalized as an intrinsic good - something that we should pursue in itself, just for the sake of it.
earlier this year, i read emile p. torres and timnit gebru's excellent research paper the TESCREAL bundle: eugenics and the promise of utopia through artificial general intelligence , which inspired me to email them with a question that had been lurking in my mind over the last few years: "what are your thoughts on efficiency-maximizing as a key driver of technocratic ideology alongside the TESCREAL bundle?" although they never responded (i'm still holding on hope - emile and timnit if you're reading this, PLEASE check your spam folders!!!!!), i hope that sharing my thoughts here will cement them on the internet forever (or at least until the internet archive goes bankrupt).
i think the thing that scares me the most about efficiency being treated as an intrinsic good by the richest and most powerful people in the world is that the pursuit of Efficiency (defined most simply as a system achieving maximum productivity with minimum effort or expense) is not based on any legitimate philosophical grounding with an interest in social welfare. the pursuit of efficiency is the pursuit towards greater wealth disparity, atomized individualism, and profit maximization no matter the actual societal cost. alas, efficiency has become the chief principle guiding the development, design, and governance structure of every major communication platform in north america.
in the absence of a shared societal metanarrative once filled by organized religion, it seems as though people are turning to abstract principle to fill the void, efficiency being one of the more popular ones among the crowning neolibs of today. egg-headed VC overlord marc andreessen believes that "the techno-capital machine of markets and innovation never ends, but instead spirals continuously upward." right. people who would have been avid allah-heads in another lifetime are now wholly devoted to the idea that pursuing an efficient free-market equilibrium, with Sultan Smith as the ruling czar, is something any Rational society should strive for.
efficiency is also sometimes considered an instrumental good, leading to things like progress and innnovation [3]. but just according to an initial gut check, it seems as though efficiency and its clinical relatives (productivity, rationalism, objectivity, innovation, utilitarianism, quantitative research, economic growth) - are diametrically opposed to inefficiency and its well-meaning but messy cousins (care, emotion, subjectivity, stagnation, deontology, qualitative research, degrowth). in trump's world, everything associated with the former is good and everything associated with the latter is bad.
and so the previously-fringe ideas of longtermist nick bostrom (the L in TESCREAL) have made their way into the white house. vice-president JD "Jeter Dhiel" vance frequently chats with evil/acc curtis yarvin. the richest man alive is leading the department of make-the-richest-man-alive-even-more-rich.
"reducing society to a series of numbers and ruling it through algorithmic procedures is an old pipe dream that still drives human ambitions. but when it comes to human affairs, tomorrow rarely resembles today, and numbers cannot determine what has moral value, nor what is socially desirable."
[1] i have mixed feelings about the use of Big Tech to criticize Big Tech. on the one hand, because the industry is, indisputably and definitionally, so very Big and Large, most of the social media landscape today is funded by it in some capacity. thus, it is nearly impossible to disseminate a message to a large group of people effectively (efficiently?) without posting about it on social media. on the other hand, there is power in independent social media as a filter for niche curation - ie. if you post about something on are.na, maybe only 2 people will see it. as it is often said of the first velvet underground album: "it only sold 10,000 copies, but everyone who bought it formed a band. ~ ancient irish proverb"
[2]these words are randomly capitalized by them, not me. i appreciate the nonsensical typography quirks but it's unfortunate that i have to read them in a govenrment memo.
[3] don't ask me why progress and innovation are considered intrinsic goods - i need to do more research on the history of 20th century technological advancements and influential science fiction narratives. while i can't stomach myself to read nick land, i can settle on ayn rand #feminism
finally, rest in peace to the real doge, whose legacy is eternally tainted by hyperderegulation.
