capitalist world. sentiments they express.
No Nukes!
CARL GARDNER's defense of nuclear power (2 February) on the grounds that developments in science and technology are neutral and free of ideology, and only progressive or oppressive character depending on the prevailing social relations, is as devoid of understanding as the ecologists he Science and technology are not merely s distaisongie scarco tor nowiedge, but are an integral part of LIE SOLICLY SUCY ICAIE IRE most research and development is funded by, controlled by, and used to strengthen and perpetuate capitalism.
Genetic and ExamDles: the neamt bach e cdsay technology to suppress (in depth interrogation, riot control equipment): CDC DUI drugs for prisoners and the mentally ill.
These and many more examples are notang morc mnan scicacine nu technological solutions to different aSPOCS O1:CaDICASDECNON contain absolutely no potential social benctits. principle that we will take over and hui d on 'all technical. Scientillc 90d cultural developmenis of previous SAECULA I Nuclear power *T'M NOT very keen on reprocessing', said Callaghan to the military dictator Zia, on a recent trip to Pakistan. But Justice Parker has decreed that Britain is keen on reprocessing nuclear waste. The Labour Government has indicated that it will back Parker, Britain will become the nuclear dustbin of the Socialist Challenge is in favour of unilateral nuclear disarmament by the Labour Government. We are opposed to the further expansion of Windscale. We do not believe that science and technology are 'neutral'.
We publish below further letters from readers on the nuclear debate. In general we agree conservation before profit?
assume regard «PODUcu MS TENESOCSREC DE POT!
Just because the hecause "high bioloeical equally vacuous every country where nukes gays:
GESSCIE supporting the mobilisations against thems. modifying woke -TEL questica slogan: No Nukes!
CHRIS PITTS (Tokyo] means of is a solution to CETOB with the the air and seas, why should we expect them to operate nukes with safety and Thus it is no more 'anti-technology то оррое пикея шав зе в во астрало that thalidomide, asbestos, or nerve Has are banncd. cron ur nc suy suspocted ситстокс, we mouse takc tc poson we aren't prepared to take the vanguard of orcankcd renistance to the nucicar threat is a little light an politics at the moment is no reason to dismiss is as a bunch of cranks and utopians. Just technology - alic- Tew. nation" is a picce of meaningless analysis is no reason to substitute the siogan high technology - potential liberation'. In of widespread usc, the organised lelt is growing popular Ir is aboot time the left in Bricain For revolutionaries, the question of nuclear power is indeed a politica] -namely how to build and educate a mass movement around the lo, and that dispute * one of the ССліга Шо 3 BI0 between revolutionaries and supporters of the wwelim Eoe if oe pese th beleat arsenal — why do they noed to be able to wipe the USA off the map five times. The answer is that in any real military terms they don't. Neither side could start a nuclear without devastating the entire planet. and they both know it. They also know that neither side can get a first strike potentiai which would prevent the other side from hitting back. The real perpose o the srins race 1 different, inthe USA it is economic (to MiIneCa HC ELEOORI political (to boliter the bureaucracy).
"Splitting the atom.. was probabl: the most important practical scientifio liscovery of the twentieth century far its results have heen (9) an additsonal source of energy, wisch isn't really necessary (ür weapons (iil) hundred, of thousands of tons of radioactive waste which Wet s DUcDIDe arewcss tor cenunes (vi) a lot of leaky nuclear r reaclors his critical (sic) faculties in the face of amesome potential of nuclear reactions. Ler's look at some of the Is nuclear power dangerous? 11 certainly is. Charlie Young asserst the "excellent safety record' of nuclear Not true. There have leaks in reactors in Britain, USA, tew. No large scale disa tens have vei Italy, India, to name bur a occured, which lulls people into a ESESESECITEL The nature of nuclear plants mean chat accident- will be relatively trivialterrilyung proportions. really have to wait for the first major spillage of radioactive material to kill and maim thousands of people hefare we recognise the dangers.
Nuclear power is necessary as a ource of energy. Untrue. There an umple means of producing energy -Fossil fuels, wave and lidal power hydro-electric, wind mention a lew. Onhy the first has major pollution problems and thes can be controlled. Unfortunately they don't all fit a5 ncatly into military-industrial complexes westera and Soviet societies.
Should we oppose the developmen of nuclear power? Yes we should. The logy and its human context (Le. its uscs, its ficancing) the use/abuse approach encourages us to consider cither one or the otier. Way cannot socialists consider botb? It is rigid, nuclear arrogast imd CHlsE complexity of such issues. use/ahuse model falscly implies that the social relations of any technology are separate trom that technologr.
Technology doesn't just happen. Peoplemakeit. So the very process of producing a technology caertain aums are omin. Chlen Du COl always (tim openers). Anyway what are these asms!
First: profit. But not always, or obviously. Consider financing of germ warfare or riol control technologies.
Second; the control of people's lives. TV doesn't commmunicate, but dictates one-way Third: making it cheaper, meaningless ant nucicar alien, Fourth: the teciinalogy, not to make life and work more sockny.usctul, Dor Eu poiaclahour (hence mnemo osticar) and to increase me productivity of the retained laboui This creates major and new contr dictions. For example, on farms agri chemicals replace hand or macbine bocing. Hoeing is no picnic, but what do the new 'scientific" sprays do to your food and to the person who dae: been the spraying? Why do we have to assube era ooc acod Is Jocu sically more progressive other!
Fifth: the use of technology as an Instant, technical "tix fundamental breakdowns, In'l this Do se nuclear power for the cow-you-see it-now-you-don't Energy Gap? Ton't this why antibiotics are given to bens in batteries where disease is rife? Yet those antibiotics bacteria to the workers who don't even cat the stuff, lel alone to the person who carcase. Neutral" Progress? to Sixth: in all singulariy anti-human, anti-socialist definition creeps in. Cost-benefit analysis, Crass the econonLisns. salely against productivity and profit. The result: humans are made to fit machines; unhealthy, repetitive work. shifts.
You may call all that lot neutral. I don't. You may believe thar collectiVIS TR problems factories improve work, bur doesn't transform it. In other approach is in key respects conserva tive. Ie's similar to telling a socialist feminist not to be so silly, The persona! isn't really politics, Or telling a car worker: don't Revolution you'll still be doing tbe same work, only it'll be for all of us. tech- How ahsurd. How uncritica.. TIM LANG [British Soclety for IUIHCEE Social Responsibility Polund St. London W'1] PVE RECENTLY READ the page oi letlers on maciesr energy (Socialist Challenge, 2 February) and it appears of Geoffrey what is poie on. As for the rest theit contributions are verbose parading of tined which ace hardly distinguishable from Stalinism and sheer Tantasy (Charlie Young)
Carl Gardner labours under the misconception that technology arc politicaily neutra., and thas che debare is purely and simply over whio has control. Thus he is able to assume that the revolution whenever that happens somebow magically traisforni nasty caputanst Beaicat wire lato cican socialist nucleir waste. Maybe p-es will fly as well! the ool He then goes oi to attack, or spurtous TUBO0IUOS concerned with SHUTCCS CITE CLICI utopians, and that such sources are the face of reality to deny 2) Thi the total consumers means thar BUIWI the caite.
the deskilling of work introduction of members so-called structural power than the considerably windmills.
IOr- MOTE economic windmills the role of spread TELENIL vltimnately cats the creation bese processes of efficiency and value Weighing up -life and technolngy ends such a stroke! lt migh words, the use/ahuse worry, after the Honorary in Science, 9 recordilg dimensions.
TaRT KnOW TrIASITS old theories (Carl Gardner) TROIT UVI DOWEE.
science and nucicEr will direction.
alternative energs truly enormious.
luddites In the first place the small scale energy policy is completely in keeping with a capitalist economy in that i allows a de socialising of a portion ol energy arocuehon making it the responsibility of the SoAr-panci,ncu pumps, windmills eic coatmodities wisch are coming on to the market ul increasing numbers. This is further in keeping wilh a capitalist coonomy in that it has as its counterpart the runof energy production and its concentration in the hands of a tiny nucelar Secondly it is to fail to sce that Chere alternatine energy advocates, manelt major division amonest berwoen those who favour small scale low technology. and those who fasour the development of very large scule high technologs. The latter policy has been best expounded by Conference of Socialist Economists WOTKIA conjunction with members of TASS ina jointly produced pamphiel.
Init their main argument is that the strugele against redundancies in the is only Likely tO succeed if it is linked to an aggressive strategy simed al radically chanping future energy policy in the particular direction oL ware and wind pomer Interestingly coough this has heen made a practical possibility as a result of technological developments which spliting witch Carl Gardne CLON Carl Gardner • culo. unstruction of a aridht offshthe advocate of massive dimensions.
This can ooly bc đone bự comh ning thri me st s eei seene of the mor latest techniques off-shore advanced technology from the aero space industry. Such a policy would lead to both the production of energy from safe renewable sources, and the very considerabli number of new jobs Charlie Yourig praises the satet recordol the nuclear industry. Well il may he true that there has not been a calaclysmic disaster yet, but we are dealing with a technology which has the potential for such a disaster to ine-span anging ome tundreds ol Sat any -mOCH MILE Tousoos of years. which ustss extremely in that it demands the creation of an Armen nuclea power polloe torce ie guard the eternally poisonous nuclear waste. Such a force is already being crealed, but it goes further than thi because it lays the foundations for the argument that the status quo should be mainrained indefinitely in order to protect us from the abyss of environmental eatastrophies. Robert Jungk, Professor of Future Studies at the Unaversity of West Berlin, stated these implications vers clearly in an article written for th Austrian magazile Neues Forurs Insl Sear. Jungk wrote:
Under the pretext that technica developments inust be safeguarder againsd "reactionaries and tadicais it is becoming necessary to erect = abd SS ETE hitberto ubknown precision and Conld the nor be thi actual motive for the all too basty development of nuclear energy? The maint af hetae tich ne much maintaining light and warmth for CINZEAS but more abou concentratine and perpetuatine their No. Carl Gardner, science and technology are not politically neutral We canmol leave the question of рояс unti 'after the revolution". It is the task of Marxists to make a serjpus intervention in the anti-nuclear power UEHCIIC order to give it a clearer politica] SUE SUCE SIE DECECETEE can only be made from an infermed position rather than from tired ole ideolegical dogipa. If we can mante revolutionars potential of chis issue is -LO nISEU SUCIraR BICIYCTRPI, CheD Cit JON WILLIAMS (London WI2]
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to this issue and became involved in it as a matter of urgcnicy.
Technology and the Strong State