Silence of the Lambs: Where have all the defenders of democracy gone?

An Interview with Dr. Benjamin R. Barber
Director of the Democracy Collaborative
University of Maryland

by Mark Compton

As smug, self-satisfied Americans continue to fatten themselves on a consumer bounty enabled in part by relentless globalization and deregulation, is it possible the free enterprise system at the root of it all may be devouring itself? And what of the democratic institutions upon which all of our most cherished liberties rest? Are they too thin to sustain our bloated appetites?

Dr. Benjamin R. Barber, arguably the preeminent democracy theorist of our time, fears that through indolence, ignorance and general passivity, we may be putting what we value most in jeopardy. As the Director of the Democracy Collaborative, Barber has become an impassioned advocate of "strong democracy", which he contrasts with the more passive traditions of "liberal democracy"--particularly where the shaping of public policy is concerned. In his many books devoted to the subject (including most recently, A Passion for Democracy and Jihad vs. McWorld: How Globalism and Tribalism are Reshaping the World), Barber expounds on his belief that common citizens should become more involved in debating matters of great civic concern as well as the development of the policies by which they're governed.

To Barber's way of thinking, the Internet represents a tremendous tool with great potential for educating and engaging the electorate--and thus enabling people to build stronger bonds with their communities even as they work to infuse government policies with their own priorities and values. Here, he speaks specifically of the possibilities for representing a broader range of viewpoints in the development of policies guiding biotechnology research. As he writes in the preface to "A Passion for Democracy", Barber acknowledges that, "I have been hard on my country. Like most ardent democrats, I want more for it than it has achieved, despite the fact that it has achieved more than most people have dared to want."

[The views and opinions expressed by the participants in this interview are not necessarily those of Geneforum, and the publication of this interview should in no way be construed as an endorsement of those views.]

[Mark Compton]: When the US government's policy on bio-engineered food was first unveiled in May of 1992, then-Vice President Dan Quayle promised that the development of biotech products would not be "hampered by unnecessary regulation." And indeed, according to an article recently published in the NY Times ["Biotechnology Food: From the Lab to a Debacle", Kurt Eichenwald, 1/25/2001], there seems to be ample evidence the industry has since been given almost complete control over its regulatory destiny. In your view, does government represent the best interests of its citizens when it effectively gives industries carte blanche to police themselves?

[Benjamin Barber]: On the contrary, I think government betrays the trust of its citizens when it privatizes the discussion and deliberation of science policy issues such as those that affect bioethics and biotechnology. The government is the guardian of our public interest, so it's responsible for ensuring that those policies likely to affect the public character of our nation--or indeed in this case, the public character of our species--are secured through citizen deliberation and participation. This is the essence of democracy, whereby the public enjoys sovereign control over the public goods of life. Which is to say that each and every citizen should be able to have some say in those decisions most likely to affect his or her life in common with the lives of others. And I can think of no area any more public in character than that which surrounds biotechnology and genetic engineering. It seems to me, in fact, that the government's first obligation should be to guarantee that these very public issues undergo very public deliberation and participation, leading ultimately to public consent.

One has to wonder whether radical deregulation is even in the best interest of the industries in question. Isn't it possible that some form of oversight may be required to temper the harshest excesses of raw capitalism--in effect, saving industries from themselves?

It's an old story, of course, that capitalism is beset by contradictions that tend not only to destroy equality, justice and democracy, but also tend to destroy capitalism itself. It's equally clear that while capitalism needs free market competition, it often works to constrain that competition by encouraging and reinforcing monopolies. What's more, we know that capitalism depends on workers who not only are paid adequate living wages but also have enough left over to buy the products they create. And yet the forces of capitalism tend to minimize wages such that employees are unable to consume what they produce and thus end up contributing to recessionary pressures. So capitalism is afflicted with many internal contradictions, and one of the things public interest democracy has done beyond ensuring that capitalism conforms to the requirements of justice, equality and fairness, is to ensure that the requisites of capitalism itself are maintained. In the '30s, the critics of Roosevelt complained that the New Deal was destroying capitalism, whereas in fact, most economists afterwards acknowledged that the New Deal had saved capitalism from itself by rescuing it from its most deleterious and injurious paradoxes. And it's within that same context that we should view deregulation today, because deregulation essentially turns capitalism over to its most base impulses, its most selfish and narrow interests--which often turn out to be not self-serving at all, but instead self-denigrating in the long term.

Part of this has to do with horizons. The horizons of private-interest selfish thinking are short term, whereas the horizons of public thinking tend to be more long term. And long-term thinking is good for selfish interests even if they can't--or are unwilling--to see that. So public participatory debates and discussions have the effect of enlarging our horizons. And that's good for everybody. Airline deregulation, on the other hand, has led to conditions that actually have damaged the airline industry. We've also witnessed the same thing in the Internet world. The Federal Communications Act of 1996, the first one since 1934, in effect deregulated all of the new telecommunications technologies and gave birth to what seemed at the time to be an extraordinary tech boom, which now has resulted in an extraordinary tech bust. And that's largely because the market was allowed to run rampant. So I think the lesson we've learned over and over again is that tempered, thoughtful government regulation has been the condition for the preservation not just of the common weal, but also of the free market itself.

Numerous articles have appeared recently suggesting that the biotech industry--and Monsanto in particular--had essentially a free run throughout the '90s in terms of shaping regulations for the development of genetically modified organisms. Possibly as a result of that, the field now appears to be all but dead.

That's a perfect example of the unintentionally, inadvertently self-destructive nature of self-interest run amok. So the people who think they're serving themselves actually end up hurting not only the public good but also their own private interests.

For citizens, what are the hazards of standing by idly while the human genome is privatized, with companies staking claims to those portions they mean to mine for profitable gain?

If we want a definition of hubris--of arrogance--and indeed the sort of hubris the ancient Greeks believed led ineluctably to tragedy, we might define it as the belief that the human genome could be privatized. If there is anything public in this universe, it's got to be the human genome--the very code that constitutes us as a species. If nothing else, that at minimum must be a common good we all own together. The very idea that we could privatize the genome and make it a subject of profitability and private interest is so hubristic and so outrageous that you almost have to think the gods are laying a trap for us. If Daedalus and Icarus thought, with their hubris, that they could fly to the sun, surely this must be the Icarus myth being played out all over again. And, really, how could there not be devastating consequences? We are, in effect, saying that the origin of our common humanity can somehow be privatized for the profit of individuals and corporations. This not only is incoherent nonsense; it's also deeply dangerous.

And strap on your seatbelt because the rush to stake out claims for the human proteome is just beginning.

Say no more. The gods must be laughing.

You've long stood as an advocate of "Strong Democracy" where people take responsibility for their own lives and take a more active role in shaping and refining public policies. But legislators to date have relied almost entirely on input from industry and the recommendations of state-appointed panels of worthies to develop science policies. How might ordinary citizens ever hope to insert themselves into that dialogue?

This is a very important question--one that goes to the very heart of this issue. There's no question that even scientists and informed citizens who are quite sympathetic to democracy wonder how, in matters of such technical complexity, we can possibly expect average citizens to exercise rational or thoughtful judgment. To get at the fallacy in that thinking, though, let me start out by drawing an analogy to our elected representatives. I mean, I've never noticed that our elected representatives are any more educated or intelligent in these matters than the average citizen--and in some cases, you might even argue they represent the lower strata of the educated populace. But that doesn't seem to stop them from making decisions. Ronald Reagan (during his eight years as chief executive) and George W. Bush (now eight weeks into his presidency) are representative of people who clearly are not technical specialists--indeed are not even highly educated--and yet both have displayed a capacity for rendering political judgments. For common citizens to participate in science policy, we'd ask nothing more of them than we do of our elected representatives. Now, to ask that the average citizen acquire the level of, say, a Dan Quayle or a Ronald Reagan doesn't seem to be much of a push. I know that sounds like I'm being rude to Quayle and Reagan, but really I'm not. What I'm saying is that whether we disagree or agree with them, politicians and representatives make judgments all the time.

And that brings us to the essential issue of what constitutes a judgment in the field of science policy. What I would argue is that what we ask of either Bush or an average citizen is not that they pass judgment on technical matters, but that they exercise sound judgment on issues of risk, resource allocation and the use of public goods. And those are matters that both informed citizens and informed representatives alike are perfectly capable of considering. Take bioengineering. The issue is not whether we're going to ask average citizens: "Do you think bioengineering is safe or not?" The issue is: "When considering whether to proceed with research in spite of conflicting information about the degree of risk, should we move forward or not?"

So we're not asking people to make scientific judgments, we're asking them to judge and assess risks on the basis of what can be learned from the testimony of experts. Likewise for the allocation of resources. We don't need to get into the fine details of plans for a hospital research center to render a judgment as to whether we want to spend more on hospitals and less on jails. It doesn't take a technical expert to reach that sort of conclusion. And most political judgments are of that nature. They assess risk and they make choices regarding the allocation of resources. And that's how it is with science policy as well--even on matters as complex as the development of the atom bomb. The public could have been invited to deliberate on whether we should build a weapon of mass destruction that might possibly help bring the war to a quicker end--or whether those resources should instead be allocated to other programs. To make that sort of decision, people don't need to know how to make the bomb. They just have to be given sufficient information to weigh the merits of the program and make decisions regarding how to properly allocate resources.

In summary, then, let me just say that these are decisions the public not only has a capacity to participate in, but also a right to participate in. And if we understand participation in science policy in that way, I think there's no reason to believe we can't have far more input and participation by the public than we've had to date.

Now, while you make a very compelling argument for why citizens don't need to have doctorates in these technical disciplines in order to render informed political judgments, surely we still need to ensure that they're properly informed?

Maybe you're right. They do need to be a bit smarter than Dan Quayle. That was setting the mark much too low.

The question is: How do you go about informing those citizens?

That's different. And, of course, that's vital since I've never heard anyone argue that democracy means empowering ignoramuses. Every democratic theorist who's ever lived--from Dewey to Jefferson to Rousseau and even earlier--has argued that citizens must be informed and educated. And indeed Thomas Jefferson and John Adams--who didn't agree on much at the time--agreed that you had to have a public school system where all people who were going to be citizens of the new American Republic could obtain a basic education…and a civic education. So there's no question that when we talk about the "citizen", we talk about someone who meets certain minimal standards of education and who has been trained in civic thinking and public deliberation. But all of that is easily within the reach of someone with a normal IQ. It certainly doesn't require a high IQ and vast technical training. Citizens need only be wise and prudent judges, armed with an ordinary range of knowledge and information. By the way, we also know the opposite to be true. Which is to say that people with highly specialized training often prove to be moral ignoramuses. There were doctors and scientists in Nazi Germany, for example, who helped conduct biological and medical experiments that were deeply immoral.

Some might make the same charge regarding our Manhattan Project.

More to the point, you might say the same about some of the folks in bioengineering who seem to be more concerned with what's likely to bring profits to their shareholders than with what might be in the best interests of our species.

What I was really hoping to drive at, though, has more to do with the mechanics of informing the population. What exactly would it take to create an informed electorate capable of deliberating policies for genetic research, for example?

It's true that some issues are more complex and so require greater training. But again, I'd insist the information and training need not be technical in nature. What's required is information about what's at stake in terms of accountability, in terms of resource allocation, in terms of risk assessment. That's what you need in order to make judgments about whether a project should proceed or not, how it should be funded and what sort of safeguards should be built in. This all falls under the heading of "civic education". The government, which has the responsibility to invite participation, also has the responsibility to provide enough information to enable intelligent decision-making. Massachusetts, for example, provides packets of information that offer three things: 1) arguments from those who support the referendum, 2) arguments from those who oppose the referendum, and 3) the state's own independent assessment. So you've got pro arguments, con arguments, and an attempt to provide a more balanced view. Then you, as the voter, are asked to render a fourth judgment on the basis of all that information. That way, the state isn't acting as the final arbiter. It's not saying what's right or wrong. It's allowing each side to put forward its own case, and then supplementing that with an analysis of its own. So part of the responsibility of the government to its citizens is not just to provide an avenue for citizen participation and decision-making, but also to supply the information and education required for the exercise of prudent judgment.

And what media might be used to accomplish that?

One of the sad things of recent years is that we have this amazing new telecommunications technology, the Net, which offers us a point-to-point, horizontal system that's deeply democratic in its architecture, and yet it goes almost entirely unused for purposes of civic education and dialogue. The Internet could be a wonderful instrument because it could be used not only to provide access to all kinds of information, but also to enable chat rooms and deliberative debates that enjoy the widest imaginable participation. You could even increase that access by making more computers available at schools and libraries. But instead we have this wondrous new technology and what do we use it for? We use it for private interest. We use it to buy and sell commercial products and pornography and B2B supply chain goods and services. It's become just one more instrument of the commercialized, privatized society. So we've essentially taken a public medium and privatized it. But in an ideal world, we'd use the Internet, radio and television, print and public meetings to invite citizens to become better versed in key science policy issues, debate important questions and fire questions at scientists involved in these matters--as well as perhaps some of their elected representatives. There are a million different things we could do. We live in an intensely communication-oriented society. Manuel Castells calls it the "information network society". And 95% of this networked environment is devoted to commerce and private entertainment. But here we have this opportunity to put one new technology, the Internet, to work on behalf of another new technology by allowing us to debate and discuss appropriate bioengineering policies. That would be a wonderful marriage! And, to me, that seems only appropriate since these information technologies are themselves public utilities that ought to be put to public uses such as civic education, voting and the vigorous discussion of science policy.

Should I take that as a call for government underwriting of educational Web sites?

Sure. Somehow, we've persuaded ourselves in our privatized society that private corporations which admittedly and explicitly are devoted to the pursuit of private interests and private profit, are better partners in objectivity than our democratically elected government, which is devoted to public interest and wholly accountable to us. So, to start with, let's take our political ideology of democracy seriously and assume that it's government, which is accountable to us, that probably is the better partner in seeking objectivity. That doesn't mean the pursuit of truth is necessarily going to be easy, but we do have plenty of tools--there's peer review, there's government oversight, there's transparency, there's accountability. And there's plurality of opinion. What the constitutional fathers said is that we don't really have to know what's right or wrong in an absolute sense; let's just make sure all the voices are heard. Clear the way so that all the contending opinions can battle it out. And that's the government's job: simply ensure that all the voices are heard. Conversely, you can be sure when you get a corporate quarterly report, you are not going to be hearing all the voices. That's not the function of private enterprise. A company's function is to make money, pure and simple.

In light of your comments about the potential of the Internet, I have to observe that in his provocative book, "Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community", Harvard sociologist Robert Putnam points to the inherently passive experience of watching television as being at the root of much of the cynicism, distrust, weakness, and social disconnection now evident in our society. By virtue of providing an interactive, point-to-point communication medium, does the Internet offer the promise of reinvigorating our culture as well as our democratic institutions?

It does precisely that. The Internet is different from television in two very important ways. It's not just that it's a point-to-point medium as opposed to a top-down medium; it's also an interactive medium. Putnam's argument is that we sit in front of the television in solitude and stare at screens that feed us, top down, from broadcasters--which is to say from those large conglomerates that own the broadcasting stations. The Internet changes that because we're allowed to talk to one another. There are no hierarchical vendors at the top feeding us information. So we end up interacting! We actually work together! This allows us to create something like a virtual community, where we're able to interact on an entirely horizontal basis, where everybody can have his or her own personal Web page. Indeed, one of the problems with the Net now is that everybody does have a Web page, including all the hate mongers and gossip mongers and deranged types who think the Martians are reprogramming their brains. But at least everybody, to some degree, has a voice. And in that sense, there's something deeply democratic about the Internet that can never be true where broadcast media is concerned. Putnam's view is that television has been a disaster for active citizenship, and I heartily agree. The Internet provides a potential boon for active citizenship, but only if we use it in that way. To date, though, it's simply become another mirror of commercial society.

Even if the content conveyed by way of the Internet was more edifying and illuminating, might it not still be said that an hour spent on the Internet is an hour not spent with other people?

If you want to ask what percentage of our time should be spent with radio, television and the Internet, I'd say we probably already spend too much time with those activities. Because you're right, they almost certainly take away from real relationships. But I guess what I'm saying is, to the extent that we are using radio, television and the Internet, I'd prefer that we spent a bit more of our time informing ourselves and debating with our fellow citizens.

Actually, I was hoping to approach that in a somewhat different way. That is, to the degree that participatory democracy depends on social interaction and we acknowledge that social skills have withered over the past few decades, what remedy do you foresee?

That's a bit like the old vaudeville joke: How's your wife? Well, compared to what? How's the Internet? Compared to what? A New England town meeting where everyone is directly engaged? Well yes, according to that standard, the Internet sucks. But in comparison to watching an episode of "Cheers" for the fifth time around, I'd have to say the Internet looks pretty good. And I've just suggested that the Internet has potential uses that aren't now being exploited--ones that could greatly contribute to our democracy. So, by no means is the Internet a panacea. But given current passivity, current solitude and current habits, the Internet could certainly be contributing a lot more than it currently does.

Getting back then to how to make better use of the Internet, what sort of devices might educational Web sites use to facilitate civil dialogue between concerned citizens?

First, I should issue a caveat, because I myself am engaged in the development of a product which I'm going to refer to simply because it helps exemplify some of the capabilities I'd like to talk about. It turns out software offers tremendous potential for enhancing the quality of deliberative communication. But anyone who participates in the chats currently available on the Net knows they're mostly garbage. They encourage lies, gossip, sexual pandering and sexual predators on the prowl. They make it all but impossible to incorporate any real knowledge. So the question is: Can we develop conversational and deliberative programs that allow real information to be introduced into debate? And can we deploy capabilities that allow people to introduce the kind of constraints on conversation that civil, orderly deliberative debates demand? I would say, yes, that sort of software can be developed.

We've got a program of our own called Unchat, which actually attempts to create a kind of anti-chat--a form of self-moderated dialogue in which people who get involved are able to set their own rules, moderate their own discussions, introduce reference libraries into their debates, and ultimately make decisions on the basis of all that. To date, ours is the only program that does that, but there are many other people who are trying to think of ways to accomplish similar things. Plenty of effective software has already been developed for buying and selling, because there's no shortage of demand for that on the Net. Well, it wouldn't be all that hard for thoughtful engineers and programmers to come up with ways to make the Net more democratic and deliberative as well. Unchat represents just one way in which the Internet might be better used as a tool for democracy. Other types of deliberative software may come along to deliver various other advantages. Integration of knowledge into conversation is just one of those areas that still needs to be tackled. But all that hinges on our commitment to develop the Internet as a tool of democracy, rather than as an obstacle to democracy.

So were the government dedicated to using the Internet as an educational tool, wouldn't that have the effect of increasing demand for the kinds of tools you're talking about? And wouldn't that, in turn, engender the development of better tools?

Indeed it would. Just to indulge in a bit of autobiography…our initial intent was to develop our software in the public sector, through government and foundation sponsorship. But we found the government and foundations to be lumbering and bureaucratic and unimaginative--pretty much just as you would expect. So we ultimately had to give up on getting funding that way. We ended up turning to the private sector instead, which I think is a bit sad. There really should be government funds available to encourage this sort of work because this stuff is expensive. It's not like the early days of the republic, when free speech consisted of printing 100 copies of a broadside and then handing them out on the street. Nowadays, you need millions of dollars just to be heard.

But then again, when those millions are spent on broadcast media or Internet content, the potential reach is commensurately larger as well.

You're right. But what I'm saying is that it's not enough just to put up a Web site. I can put up my Web site, but that doesn't mean I'm going to be able to compete effectively with Merck & Company for attention. Free speech means not only the right to speak, but also the right to be heard. And in a modern society, the right to be heard unfortunately is quite costly.

Since neither one of us is holding our breath waiting for the government to bankroll the sort of tools you're talking about, how might the Internet best be used in the near term to encourage participatory democracy?

The real question is: Who's going to take responsibility for that? I would say initially that public-spirited public officials have to take the lead. Because right now, an awful lot of public officials seem to be putting an undue emphasis on technical expertise. They doubt their own prudence, their own judgment, saying: "This is far too complex even for us, so how can we possibly expect our constituents to form meaningful opinions? Let's just go get the experts involved instead." I'd propose that's looking at it the wrong way. I'd prefer that they looked long and hard at how to engage their constituents in those sorts of discussions. And whenever there are expert panels, they should be looking for ways to get their constituents involved in those as well. But, as it stands, even those public officials who have their own Web sites use them chiefly to raise more money and to propagate their own propaganda. My feeling is that whenever a congressman says: "I'm going to use my Web site to debate the issues with my constituents", that in itself should serve as a great advertisement for that congressman.

But the current reality is better illustrated by the Bush administration, which to date has shown little enthusiasm for public involvement, debate, or dialogue of any kind, preferring instead to rely on industry rump groups to shape policy proposals. For those who believe the public should at least be consulted on matters bearing directly on their health and well-being, do you suppose this decided preference for backroom politics may ultimately prove galvanizing?

Let me start by saying I think the current administration represents the worst of all worlds because while we've been arguing here about whether the big decisions should be left to the technocrats and experts, or instead be given over to the citizens and their elected representatives, this administration relies on neither. They're apparently not interested in what the scientists might have to say and they're certainly not interested in what the constituents think. They appear to be solely interested in what the corporate interests have to say. That's obviously the case where global warming is concerned, for example. There, the administration has indicated that they're chiefly interested in reducing the cost burdens that might fall to their corporate backers. They've shown that what they want, in effect, is to liberate the fossil fuel corporations to dig anywhere they want, whether that be in Colorado or Alaska--no matter what the environmental consequences. So what we have is a president who neither thinks about matters wisely himself, nor is willing to consult the experts, and most certainly has no interest in talking to the general public, but rather is keen to mold policies according to the wishes of special interests. And you can be quite certain that's always the most disastrous way to make policy. We'd clearly be better off with a government directed by scientific experts or one guided by ordinary ignorant citizens than with one so obviously beholden to self-serving private interests.

What's more, the Bush administration doesn't even make a pretense of communicating with the public by way of the media--having already indicated that the president will no longer be engaging in press conferences. Questions and interaction of any sort with the president have been expressly disallowed.

Well, why should Bush speak with the press? For an administration so obviously in the service of business interests, all that's really necessary is to go directly to the corporations and ask what they want.

About the Interviewer

Mark Compton monitors trends in information technology and biotechnology from a comfortable perch midway between the Silicon Valley and Oregon's Silicon Forest.