DailyPost 932
THE POLITICS OF TECHNOLOGY
If there was no politics of technology, one can say one can safely say the world would have been a level playing field by now. All the make believe democratisation by technology could have become real and the physical changes in quality of life would have been visible. The technology would have reached a different level of pricing and money would have found its way based on free market forces rather than the policies decided by companies and governments. Direct connection between demand and supply is for the textbooks.
Undeniably, controlling the world can happen only with technology, an accepted fact now. The governments of different countries have since times immemorial played politics with technology trying to control the direction, usage, business and impact. The custom barriers, common markets and the like. This is the politics of capitalism. But this is only one part of the story, the politics is also at the enterprise level, everything is not decided by technology and business; the cartels, technology / know how transfer, binding clauses, the intermediaries, licensing and the like.
The business environment is not conducive to the small players, ignorant customers, undeveloped and developing countries and in general all customers. The politics is to keep under control the technologies of military power, of scientific advancement, of technological change and mass scale impact. This also plays into the mercenary exploitation of profit and power. From the nuclear non-proliferation treaty to the 5G race between the China and US. Business and politics are thus one and the same.
The Chinese firewall is more about politics and has very little to do with technology. Technology makes it happen. The chip wars are still on and China is still at the receiving end. It is so sad that the commonly used technologies are not the technically commonly known technologies. It is politics of black box, everybody needs to develop his own technology. Intellectual property and patents add to mess in their favour. Technology is the handmaid of politics and business. It could have delivered much better on its own.
BUSINESSES DICTATE TECHNOLOGY AND THE GOVERNMENTS INJECT POLITICS INTO IT.
Sanjay Sahay