<nettime> About my project TECHNOCOMMUNISM

[KOUU MOU via nettime-l <nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>]

Dear all,



My name is Mou, I’m a student from China currently studying in Japan, and I
have been engaged in critical or speculative design for several years.



Recently, I completed a work titled *TECHNOCOMMUNISM* as a response to the
discussions on neo-feudalism. I have been concerned about the
transformation of the capitalist system for years. Coming from the
background of an authoritarian regime in China, I have found dilemmas both
within capitalism and within the nation-state system itself. This led me to
search for a new systemic alternative through an intuitive and critical
design approach.



However, this topic is rarely discussed within my discipline today, even
though similar systemic explorations were once popular among artists and
designers in the 1960s and 1970s. I would be deeply grateful if I could
receive any advice or thoughts from here.



My work is freely available for reading and download on the Internet
Archive:
https://archive.org/details/technocommunism-by-moukouu-english



*About TECHNOCOMMUNISM (excerpt from the text):*

“I would like to summarize the tasks I hope to accomplish in this work.
First, to construct a critical, bird's-eye perspective on the political and
economic systems of human society under the current context of continuous
globalization of capitalism, worsening environmental issues, intensifying
geopolitical conflicts, the rise of a new feudal class, technological
amplification of authoritarian political powers, and the resurgence of
nationalism. In the following content, I will refer to this as “a hungry,
top-down, fragile Big Model of Society” (abbreviated as the Big Model of
Society). Second, to attempt to conceptualize a post-disaster, bottom-up,
democratic, and decentralized new model of society that is dialectically
critical of such a system (reflecting on the existing social system from
outside).

…

You might naturally ask, why communism? Why use the notorious term
‘communism’, which has gained such a negative reputation following the
communist movements of the 20th century? I believe there are two reasons
for this. The first reason is to provoke in a stand-up comedy-like way. As
can be seen in earlier parts of this article, I am unequivocally critical
of the communist movements of the 20th century and the authoritarian
communist regimes that exist today. However, even so, I believe that an
excessive aversion to the term ‘communism’ has blocked people from
reflecting on its conceptual essence. This aversion has led overly
simplistic critics to abandon contextual judgment and stop listening to the
intentions of those who use the term. The second reason, as Slavoj Žižek
describes himself as a ‘conservative moderate communist’ and uses the term
‘communism’ to advocate for the large-scale global cooperation he deems
necessary, is that I use the term TECHNOCOMMUNISM also to express a form of
collaboration. However, this collaboration is bottom-up, based on
individual, decentralized and supported by high-tech.

TECHNOCOMMUNISM is not merely a resistance to the capitalist system or the
state system; more importantly, it is a resistance to power relations, a
resistance against the concentration of power.

Although this is a positive utopia, I do not hold an optimistic view of the
context in which such a utopia might exist. In other words, even if such a
utopia were possible, I do not believe that human society could achieve
such a transformation through peaceful means. This is a sorrowful and
pessimistic perspective, but I believe that, in a situation where the
"train" of the current system cannot stop moving forward, it is not so
difficult to imagine a massive disaster — one that represents a big bang of
the existing social order. Within the cracks of such a catastrophic event,
there might be a glimmer of hope.”



Thank you!

Mou
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