[governance] MEASURING the digital space - whose MEASURES apply, and whose do not

[Craig Simon]

Michael Gurstein's reflection on "what and whose measures apply in the 
digital space" strikes me as very productive. Having been curious for 
quite some time about the extent to which the advent of the Internet 
compares to the advent of the movable type printing technology, I'll 
offer this conjecture about the implications.

Key measures of human agency in the pre-Westphalian era in Europe 
included concerns such as who could get into heaven and who could 
legitimately be crowned king, queen, prince, etc. The socially accepted 
chain of authority generally led up through officials of the Holy Roman 
Empire as the effective gatekeepers of such things. (Keeping in mind 
that any given Pope and his appointed agents claim to be acting as proxy 
for a divine gatekeeper.)

The Gutenberg revolution facilitated the emergence of sovereign royals 
-- and ultimately sovereign nation-states -- who were, among other 
things, gatekeepers of national citizenship, contractual regimes, and 
property rights within bounded territories.

In both cases, given this view of things, gatekeepers played an 
essential role conferring agency within a social structure. Gatekeeping 
roles will be no less important in the densely internetworked future. 
That why there was such a big fight over DNS administration... 
possessing one's "name" was once considered essential to having an 
effective presence on the Web. Now we see battles between Facebook, 
LinkedIn, Google, other private operators, and also various 
state-controlled social networks, all vying to be the gatekeeper of 
one's authentic presence on line.

In all of these spaces, pre-Westphalian, Westphalian, and 
post-Westphalian, there's a consistent concerning with counting who is 
an agent and measuring the relative powers of those agents.

Craig Simon

On 8/30/11 7:16 PM, michael gurstein wrote:
> To shift the argument a bit from the current interesting but now rather
> repititious issues...
>
> One of the basic understandings of the Philosophy/Sociology of Science is
> that we all tend to reduce our understanding of new phenomena down to a mode
> which is intelligible within our existing framework of
> understanding/knowledge.  When it is no longer possible to do this then a
> new framework (paradigm) comes haltingly forward that allows us to explain
> those phenomena that remain inexplicable--incommensurable--with the attempts
> at imposing the existing framework and a new frammework/paradigm of
> understanding is born and very soon becomes the new orthodoxy and in turn
> becomes "that of which it is impossible to consider an alternative".
>
> I think these somewhat simple "truths" are reflected quite well in the
> current discussion.
>
> One of the core elements of these conceptual frameworks are the various
> systems of standards/definitions/measurements that allow us to order and
> "manage" our processes of knowing and thus our actions in the world.
>
> As examples, Paul's system of national legal frameworks is one such
> paradigm, McTim's system of IETF formulated and prescribed standards is
> another.
>
> In the economics (and thus to a considerable degree the policy) world one of
> the basic frameworks is the SNA--the System of National Accounts which
> presents a means for a consolidated measurement at the national level (and
> thus comparative at the global level) of "all significant economic
> activity".
>
> As we all know, much of current economic policy nationally (and globally)
> (within the competitive market/neo-liberal policy environment) is founded
> on/driven by these measures as outputted as GDP/GNP etc.
>
> Various waves of civil society interventions have subjected these
> measurement procedures/strategies to what might be called "paradigmatic"
> critiques--the consumer's movement critiqued the exclusive focus on
> production (and the absence of measurements concerned with
> consumption/consuming); the environmental movement critiqued on the basis of
> the absence of measures reflecting the lifecycle costs of goods and
> including impacts on the environment from resource depletion and
> contributions to environmental degradation and change); the women's movement
> critiqued on the basis of a failure to include measures reflecting women's
> contribution to domestic work; ;  and as well there have been a number of
> critiques/alternatives proposed along the lines of the GPI--General
> Performance Index, and the recently widely noted "Happiness Index"--these
> latter being presented as more meaningful and significant from a
> "sustainablity" policy perspective.
>
> (As well, the SNA has a very strong bias away from the measurement of
> "social capital" related activities (and towards the measurement of
> production of physical goods). In many respects this area is perhaps the
> most damaging from the perspective of Less Developed Countries and the poor
> and marginalized in Developed countries since it tends to privilege (and
> give emphasis to) the production of consumer goods (and public policies
> supportive of this production) over for example, public investments in
> social capital related activities such as education, health and social
> support.)
>
> I'm wondering in this context whether there are areas of issues concerning
> measurement and indices specifically associated with the Internet that would
> be of particular interest to civil society that might (or might not) be of
> interest from the perspective of a "critique" of the SNA and broad measures
> such as the the GDP--parallel to the critiques related to the measurement of
> "women's work" and "environmental costing" for example.
>
> The obvious measurement(s) are of course related to the "digital divide" --
> those who have access and (I would add) the capability of using the Internet
> and those who do not. But I'm also thinking that there may be an additional
> set of arguments that quite significantly link back to the earlier critiques
> and those have to do with the linkage of the Internet with social capital.
>
> Thus, it might be possible (and reasonable) to argue that the enhancement of
> social capital (internetworking, communication at a distance, speeding up of
> communications etc.etc.) while not unique to the Internet is so much
> accelerated and intensified by the Internet that "quantity" becomes
> "quality" that is, the Internet adds so much to these elements of social
> capital (and is so much a product of previous investments in social capital)
> that:
>      1. it would be impossible realistically to "measure" the economic impact
> of the Internet without including measurements of the intensification of
> social capital--social capital is of the very "essence" of the impact
> (social, economic, cultural) of the Internet that one is trying to measure
> ("the Internet changes everything" effect). The Internet fundamentally
> changes the nature of economic (and of course other) relations and
> activities and the intensification of social capital being of the very
> essence of the Internet means that this intensification of social capital
> must similarly be accounted for in one's measurements associated with the
> SNA.
>
>      2. the Internet through its intensification of social capital is
> transformative (and not simply summative) of the overall economy, economic
> relations, transactions, production, distribution and consumption; such that
> it is impossible to describe let alone measure the various components of the
> SNA without including various of the Internet (and thus social capital)
> related impacts in any assessment and thus measurement of each of these
> components (the "Walmart effect"). Thus, for example, a company such as
> Walmart would not be possible without the affordances provided by
> telecommunications/the Internet and hence any measurement including Walmart
> as a component needs to include measures reflecting this relationship.
>
> The value of such an argument from a civil society perspective I think, is
> that it links overall economic activity (GDP) with the Internet, and links
> the Internet with the production of social capital which in turn becomes
> something of a backdoor way of arguing that investment in ICT should be as
> much focused on education, health, and social support as it is on bits and
> bytes--hardware and software--something I'm assuming we all agree with but
> also something which is not taken as a necessary given by those folks
> managing current economic policies.
>
> Comments, critiques, suggestions with respect to the above are gratefully
> welcomed.
>
> (Incidentally, I'll be in Paris Sept. 12-19, exceptionally with some time to
> spare so if anyone is in Paris at the time and interested in a meet-up to
> discuss this or IGC or CS or other issues I would be delighted.
>
> Best,
>
> Mike
>
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