1

Automation and Freedom:

A Study of Two Solutions to an Automated Economy’s

Threat to Liberty

2017

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Contents

Contents ............................................................................................................................................2

Abstract .............................................................................................................................................3

Introduction ......................................................................................................................................4

Chapter One: What’s the Problem with Automation? .........................................................................8

Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. 8

Ideal Societies and the Definition of Liberty ............................................................................................. 8

The History of Liberty .............................................................................................................................. 10

The Future of Liberty and Economic Unfreedom ................................................................................... 12

The Impact of Automation ...................................................................................................................... 15

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 19

Chapter Two: Universal Basic Income ............................................................................................... 20

Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 20

Arguments for the UBI ............................................................................................................................ 21

Practical Examples and Popular Criticism ............................................................................................... 24

Marx, Althusser, and the Incentives of the Owners ............................................................................... 26

Rousseau and Dependence ..................................................................................................................... 28

Marx and Relations of Production .......................................................................................................... 29

Mauss, Derrida, and the UBI as a ‘Gift’ ................................................................................................... 31

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 33

Chapter Three: Fully Automated Luxury Communism ........................................................................ 35

Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 35

Wealth Dispersal, Community, and Maximal Liberty ............................................................................. 36

Overcoming the Problems of the UBI ..................................................................................................... 38

The Problem of Violence ......................................................................................................................... 39

Nozick, Cohen, and Distributive Justice .................................................................................................. 42

Conclusion ............................................................................................................................................... 45

Conclusion ....................................................................................................................................... 46

Bibliography .................................................................................................................................... 49

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Abstract

Automation will inevitably result in huge shifts in our social, political, and economic lives. Already

automation threatens the jobs of many, and the acceleration of technological innovation will only make it

more of a factor. Eventually it is conceivable that an entire economy could become automated. This

dissertation aims to outline the threats posed to a society by automation – specifically its threat to

individual liberty – and then find a solution. The dissertation begins with a discussion of the state of liberty

in society and its importance, followed by an analysis of how liberty is likely to be affected by automation.

The dissertation then continues with an exploration of two solutions to the problem of automation and

liberty: the universal basic income (UBI) and fully automated luxury communism (FALC). Ultimately, the

dissertation finds that FALC is superior to UBI as a method of securing liberty in society, as the UBI fails to

maximise liberty, and indeed in some cases serves to entrench unfreedom. The dissertation concludes with

a note on the importance and urgency of questions about the future of free societies and the threat of

automation upon them.

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Introduction

In 1989, the eminent international relations scholar Francis Fukuyama proclaimed ‘the end of

history’.1 The Cold War was over, and with it the great ideological battle between communism and

capitalism, East and West, had been won. Western, democratic, capitalistic liberalism had prevailed as the

only viable social, political, and economic framework.2 Liberalism had been, and would continue to be, so

stable because, as Fukuyama saw it, it contained no fundamental contradictions.3 The woes in society,

such as economic inequality, “do not have to do with the underlying legal and social structure of our

society,”4 but rather something else which will eventually wither away. Fukuyama does not expand on

this, and indeed acknowledges the growth of economic inequality, but denies its links to our economic

system. This is dubious in itself, although perhaps not indefensible – Fukuyama, for example, explains

away black poverty as the “legacy of slavery and racism,”5 rather than being perpetuated by liberalism.

Fukuyama goes on to suggest that liberalism’s lack of fundamental contradictions, along with its

ideological success, will result in its spreading to every society on earth, eventually producing one

“universal homogenous state.”6

Not everyone, however, agrees with Fukuyama’s conception of the post-Cold War world. Derrida

chastises Fukuyama for ignoring liberalism’s responsibility for the “violence, inequality, exclusion, famine,

and thus economic oppression”7 present in the modern day, and for attempting to stifle the debate

1 Fukuyama, F., ‘The End of History?’, The National Interest, no. 16, 1989, pp. 3-18. 2 Ibid., p. 4. 3 Ibid., p. 9. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid. 6 Ibid., p. 17. 7 Derrida, J., Specters of Marx (1993), Kamuf, P. (trans.), Abingdon, UK, Routledge, 1994, p. 106.

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“between the great emancipatory discourses.”8 The ‘end of history’ has been further critiqued by many

thinkers, ranging from feminists9, to postcolonialists10, to conservatives such as Samuel Huntington.11

However, there is a different way in which Fukuyama fails to encapsulate reality. This dissertation

will suggest that there is a fundamental contradiction within capitalism which will lead either to dystopia,

or its demise. This contradiction is based on three premises. First, that capitalism always tends towards

profitability. Second, that automation has emerged as the clear way to achieve profitability. Third, that

automation presents a serious threat to liberty in a society. The amalgamation of these premises leads to

the knowledge that, somewhat inevitably, an automated economy will arise which will seriously threaten

the liberty of individuals in society. This dissertation is firstly an attempt to articulate the threats posed to

liberty by automation, and secondly an exploration of two solutions to those threats.

The first chapter will situate this exploration within the context of contemporary society and thought.

It will firstly lay out what a just society might look like, arguing that a society which prioritises the liberty

of its citizens is a reasonable goal. It will then discuss what ‘liberty’ might entail, contrasting the views of

Mill, Hayek, and Cohen. It will settle on a Rawlsian definition of liberty as the freedom of choice for an

individual, in a broad sense; and of a just society as one which maximises liberty overall whilst also

maximising the liberty of the least free individual. The chapter will then analyse the past, present, and

future threats which automation (and other forces) pose to this ideal, arguing that automation’s effect on

individuals’ economic security (already manifesting itself in stagnant wages and rising unemployment) is

complex yet significant. The chapter concludes with a warning about how a fully automated economy has

8 Derrida, J., Specters of Marx, 1994, p. 106. 9 Tolan, F., Margaret Atwood: Feminism and Fiction, Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2007, pp. 255-6. 10 Scott, D., ‘The Aftermaths of Sovereignty: Postcolonial Criticism and the Claims of Political Modernity’, Social Text, no. 48, 1996, pp. 1-26. 11 Huntington, S., ‘The Clash of Civilizations?’, Foreign Affairs, vol. 72, no. 3, 1993, pp. 22-49.

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the potential to severely curtail liberty in a society, and introduces two solutions to these threats which

will be discussed in turn in the next two chapters: the universal basic income (UBI), and fully automated

luxury communism (FALC).

The second chapter focusses on the first solution to the problem of automation – the universal basic

income, or UBI. It will begin with an outline of the UBI. This will include an exploration of its key features,

what its designed to achieve, and the arguments of its proponents such as Parijs and Widerquist. Next it

will discuss the various critiques often levelled at the practicality of the UBI, arguing that they insufficiently

provide a threat to the UBI, particularly when applied to an automated economy. However, the chapter

will proceed with a discussion of several more substantial critiques: that the UBI incentivises non-maximal

distribution of liberty; that it entrenches dependence; that it insufficiently tackles unfreedom generated

in production; and, finally, that its reliance on redistribution necessarily engenders asymmetrical power-

dynamics which harm liberty. These critiques are significant enough to derail the UBI’s capacity for

providing maximal liberty in society, and in fact show how it often entrenches oppression rather than

emancipation. The chapter will conclude that the UBI is an inadequate solution to the threats posed to

liberty by automation, leading us into the third chapter which focusses on the second solution: FALC.

The third chapter suggests a more radical alternative which promises to bring greater, longer-lasting,

and more authentic liberty to a society with an automated economy: fully automated luxury communism,

or FALC. The chapter will begin with an outline of FALC, specifically how it differs from the UBI, and how

it purports to achieve maximal liberty. Next, the chapter will demonstrate how FALC overcomes the

critiques which undermine the UBI. It will then explore two potential problems: first, whether violent

revolution contradicts FALC’s stated aim of maximally producing liberty; and second, whether, as Nozick

argues, any form of patterned justice (including the UBI and FALC) violates individuals’ right to free

exchange. I will conclude that these problems, although considerable, can be overcome by FALC.

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Ultimately, this dissertation will comprehensively demonstrate how FALC is the best solution to the

threats posed by automation to liberty in a society.

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Chapter One: What’s the Problem with Automation?

Introduction

This first chapter aims to discern what kind of threats automation might pose to a future society, in

preparation for the next two chapters’ analysis of two solutions. To achieve this, we must first ascertain

what a truly just society might look like, so as to establish a compass with which to orient our endeavour.

In this regard, the chapter begins with a discussion of what might constitute a ‘free society’. This is then

contrasted with an analysis of how contemporary and future societies are likely to be affected by

automation. The chapter, having found that automation presents a real threat to liberty in society,

concludes with an introduction to two solutions which will be assessed in the proceeding chapters.

Ideal Societies and the Definition of Liberty

Firstly, however, we must conceive of an ideal society. It is a reasonable – albeit broad - aim for any

society to increase the ability of its members to choose to engage in their particular conception of ‘good

life’. This involves eliminating social, political, and economic barriers to the freedom of choice. This I will

call liberty. In a sense this is a variation on a utilitarian argument. If utility can be equated with freedom

of choice, then maximising utility for the greatest proportion of people would be society’s goal. This is not

an unreasonable equivalence; if members of society have truly broad ‘freedom’ to choose their

conception of the good life, this freedom is not dissimilar to J. S. Mill’s argument in Utilitarianism, “that

actions are right in proportion as they tend to promote happiness, wrong as they tend to produce the

reverse of happiness.”12 However, Mill had previously argued in On Liberty that “the only purpose for

12 Mill, J. S., ‘Utilitarianism’ (1863), in M. Philp and F. Rosen (eds.), John Stuart Mill: On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays, Oxford, UK, Oxford University Press, 2015, p. 121.

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which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community… is to prevent harm

to others.”13 When taken together, these statements suggest Mill believes utility is promoted by

maximising liberty. The issue here is not with this statement per se, but rather with Mill’s definition of

liberty. He understands it purely as the absence of coercion from external forces, such as government.

However, he does not believe that socio-economic limits on freedom are valid14; along with many pre-

Marxian philosophers, he privileges idealised, political freedom, yet disregards material restraints on

liberty. More modern thinkers such as Friedrich Hayek and Isaiah Berlin also argue for a purely negative

conception of freedom, arguing that freedom is simply freedom from coercion – a lack of funds does not

constitute, for instance, Hayek’s definition of coercion.15

GA Cohen resists this narrow view, suggesting that economic wealth is an essential component to

liberty – money under capitalism, he says, constitutes a “freedom ticket”16 – and that to deny its relation

to freedom is disingenuous. Consequently, Mill’s support for unfettered capitalism, for instance, may be

compatible with total political liberty, yet is at odds with a positive conception of liberty – one which

defines freedom as the capacity for actual choice. A laissez-faire economic system is likely to condemn

many to a life of pure subsistence and poverty17, which would necessarily limit their ability to pursue their

conception of ‘the good life’; it is true that they would have the political freedom to choose, but

nevertheless they could not actually choose. I will proceed using a positive conception of liberty, which

takes into account all political, social, and economic factors in determining an individual’s liberty.

13 Mill, J. S., ‘On Liberty’ (1859), in M. Philp and F. Rosen (eds.), John Stuart Mill: On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays, Oxford, UK, Oxford University Press, 2015, p. 12. 14 Mill, J. S., On Liberty, 2015, p. 92. 15 Hayek, F. A. (1960), The Constitution of Liberty, Abingdon, UK, Routledge, 2006, p. 118. 16 Cohen, G. A., ‘Freedom and Money’, in On the Currency of Egalitarian Justice, and Other Essays in Political Philosophy, Princeton, US, Princeton University Press, 2011, p. 182. 17 Hence why all advanced societies have developed some form of welfare to accommodate for the stratification effect inherent in capitalism.

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Additionally, as Rawls notes, all utilitarianism – not merely Mill’s form – is flawed in its “not tak[ing]

seriously the distinction between persons.”18 For example, under a purely utilitarian system of justice, one

person can be entirely deprived of their freedom, if that deprivation leads to an overall increase in the

community’s freedom. In order to address this problem, we can look to Rawls’ first ‘principle of justice’

which states that certain basic rights, such as the right to vote, freedom of thought, freedom from slavery

and arbitrary arrest etc., must be maintained for all citizens.19 This prevents utilitarian abuses. This

dissertation will, therefore, take ‘liberty’ to mean freedom of choice for an individual.20 This encompasses

political freedom, the power to influence the socio-political condition of a society, but also economic and

social freedom; the power to choose how to govern your own life. In essence, this is a marrying of two

forms of sovereignty; sovereignty over both the public and private spheres. The perfectly just society,

therefore, is one which maximises liberty overall whilst also maximising the liberty of the least free

individuals. This accords with Rawls’s ‘difference principle’, which states that inequality is tolerable as long

as said inequality benefits the least well-off person.21 I shall refer to this method as the securing of

‘maximal liberty’. Such a society is what we shall aim for, and the one with which we shall compare our

conception of a future characterised by an automated economy.

The History of Liberty

This dissertation will mainly consider the impact of automation on liberty within developed countries

(mostly those in the West, and Japan). This is because automation is most advanced in these areas and is

likely to impact them sooner. Focussing on developed countries also narrows down the question and

provides fewer variables for our investigation. This is not to say automation does/will not have a

18 Rawls, J., A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, US, Harvard University Press, 1971, p. 27. 19 Ibid., p. 60. 20 For the purposes of this dissertation I will also use the words ‘liberty’ and ‘freedom’ as synonyms, unlike other thinkers such as Arendt. 21 Rawls, J., A Theory of Justice, 1971, pp. 60-61.

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significant impact within other countries. Indeed, it is likely to fundamentally affect global trade and will

probably accelerate international development. This is a topic, as I will note in the conclusion, which

requires further study.

It is now necessary to explore our concept of liberty historically in order to contextualise and better

understand the state of liberty in modern society. Under the feudal model, the majority of people (as

peasants) had limited power: they could contribute to very few political decisions, their fates were in the

hands of feudal lords and land owners, and they had almost no economic opportunities to either change

or improve their position. In other words, they had severely limited freedom. Then, as a result of the

industrial revolution among other factors, power was to some extent democratised. Political systems and

governments shifted away from authoritarianism and towards democracy; individuals became protected

by systems of human rights; and the freedom of choice of how to live one’s life improved dramatically as

technology, communications, transport, and income increased. Improved income was a particularly

important change, because it gradually gave individuals more leisure time and, crucially, the liberty to buy

those commodities which they believed could improve their lives.

Alexis de Tocqueville might disagree with this notion. In The Old Regime and the Revolution, he

argues that those in pre-revolution, feudal France enjoyed significant freedom which they derived from

mutual dependency and association.22 After the revolution and with the onset of democracy, this was lost

as centralisation and individualism proliferated, leading to a lack of association or interest in engaging

with politics.23 Similarly, in Democracy in America, Tocqueville warns against a subtle ‘democratic

22 Tocqueville, A., The Old Regime and the Revolution, Bonner, J. (trans.), New York, US, Harper & Brothers, 1856, p. 64. 23 Ibid., p. 65.

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despotism’, in which the centralised state gradually “renders the employment of free will less useful and

more rare... and little by little steals the very use of free will from each citizen."24

This is an interesting take on the history of liberty, and questions the assumption that our democratic

society necessarily means we are free. If we are individualistic, atomised beings with little interest or

influence on politics, then are we truly free? Ultimately, I would argue yes – or, at least more free in

industrialised democracy than under a feudal system. This is because, although we may be less socially

engaged, universal suffrage and much greater leisure time have emancipated us both politically and

individually. Furthermore, our economic freedom has vastly improved; although the state may perform

some of those tasks which make us free and independent, this in turn has granted us time to engage in

our own endeavours, and our range of choice in the modern day is nonetheless greater in most senses –

politically, vocationally, geographically etc. Thus, we can accept the premise that liberty has generally

improved as the human race has developed.

The Future of Liberty and Economic Unfreedom

This leaves us with several questions: what can we expect to come of liberty in the future? Will an

individuals’ freedom continue to increase? And what processes might affect this change?

One of the most important mechanisms which affects personal liberty is the economy. Indeed,

historical materialists contend that the economy is the dominant force driving history, and thus is

intimately linked with the changing character of liberty. So how have recent economic changes impacted

liberty? Firstly, real median household disposable income and median income in general has stagnated in

24 Tocqueville, A., Democracy in America (1840), Mansfield, H. C. and Winthrop, D. (trans.), Chicago, US, University of Chicago Press, 2000, p. 663.

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recent years, both in the US25 and the UK,26 and particularly for working households. Similarly, as

economists Pessoa and Reenen point out, building on work from Bernstein, the rates of employment and

productivity in the US and UK have decoupled since the 1990s, having previously been assumed to be

indefinitely linked.27 Furthermore, along with productivity, both GDP and corporate profits are at record

levels, and are steadily increasing.28 29 Necessarily, this all means that inequality has increased

dramatically, and that the richest are less reliant on workers to achieve their profits. Indeed, on a global

scale inequality has risen so much that just eight individuals own as much wealth as the poorest three and

half billion, according to the charity Oxfam.30 In this way, not only productivity and employment, but in

fact the very rates of income between the ‘ordinary’, median household, and the highest earners, have

been decoupled.

There are several explanations for this rising income inequality. Picketty, in his book Capital, argues

that “a market economy based on private property, if left to itself… contains powerful forces of

divergence.”31 He notes that, because the rate of return on capital tends to be greater than the rate of

growth of income and output, wealth will inevitably accumulate in the hands of those who invest, rather

25 Real median income is less than in 1999, the highest figure for 30 years – Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (US), ‘Real Median Household Income in the United States’, 2016, https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/MEHOINUSA672N, (accessed 14/02/17) 26 Office for National Statistics (UK), ‘Report on Middle Income Households, 1977-2011/12’, (Figure 2.), 2013, http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20160105160709/http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171776_303386.pdf, (accessed 14/02/17). 27 Pessoa, J. P. and Reenen, J. V., ‘Decoupling of Wage Growth and Productivity Growth? Myth and Reality’, Resolution Foundation, 2012. 28 Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (US), ‘Real Gross Domestic Product Per Capita’, 2017, https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/A939RX0Q048SBEA, (accessed 14/02/17). 29 Bureau of Economic Analysis (US), ‘Corporate Profits: Fourth Quarter and Annual 2016’, (Table 12), 2017, https://www.bea.gov/newsreleases/national/gdp/2017/pdf/gdp4q16_3rd.pdf, (accessed 04/04/2017). 30 Hardoon, D., ‘An Economy for the 99%’, Oxfam, 2017, http://policy-practice.oxfam.org.uk/publications/an-economy-for-the-99-its-time-to-build-a-human-economy-that-benefits-everyone-620170, (accessed 14/02/17). 31 Picketty, T., Capital, Goldhammer, A. (trans.), Cambridge, US, Harvard University Press, 2014, p. 446.

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than those who work. Thus, those who have capital to invest will gain more, and inequality will increase.

Picketty contends that this is the “central contradiction of capitalism.”32

Stiglitz, rather than blaming inherent contradictions in capitalism itself, instead looks to the political

power the wealthy hold to perpetuate inequality. He argues in The Price of Inequality that the wealthy in

power in the US use their influence to lobby for deregulation of the free market.33 This results, perhaps

contradictory to common assumptions, in a reduction of competition, as those who cannot afford to

compete have their influence reduced even further, producing spiralling inequality.34

Furthermore, as technology and neoliberalism result in ever greater internalisation and

interdependence of states’ economies, wealth inequality within countries will rise. Bourguignon argues

that globalisation has a tendency, when left alone, to spread the “inequality that developed over two

centuries between nations… within these nations themselves.”35 European industrialisation and

colonialism had initially created inequality between the ‘West’ and the ‘rest’. But now, as globalisation

removes geographical and technological barriers, the richest can exist independently of states, leaving

those in developed countries to feel economic strain as much as those in developing countries. Galtung,

building on dependency theorists and Wallerstein, furthers a similar position. He argues that as global

capitalism proliferates, the richest in any given countries/regions are likely to be more sympathetic to -

and have more in common with - the richest in other countries/regions than with the poorer in their own

country.36 This means, he argues, that the most powerful individuals and groups across the world have a

stake in maintaining the capitalist world system, and are concerned little about inequality. This is likely to

32 Picketty, T., Capital, Harvard University Press, 2014, p. 446. 33 Stiglitz, J., The Price of Inequality, New York, US, W. W. Norton & Company, 2013, p. 46. 34 Ibid., p. 123. 35 Bourguignon, F., The Globalization of Inequality (2012), Scott-Railton, T. (trans.), Princeton, US, Princeton University Press, 2015, p. 184. 36 Galtung, J., ‘A Structural Theory of Imperialism’, Journal of Peace Research, vol. 8, no. 2, p. 84.

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perpetuate the growing gulf in income in all nations, as globalisation gives the means of increasing capital

(without its spread) to those who are willing to accept inequality.

The Impact of Automation

These explanations – the inherent contradictions within capitalism; the disproportionate political

power wielded by the rich; and globalisation – are all contributing factors to the increase in wealth

inequality. And, as we have determined, economic inequality corresponds to inequality of liberty as well.

However, this dissertation will contend that the most important force threatening economic liberty – and

the one which is most likely to accelerate enormously in the coming decades – is automation. By

‘automation’, what is meant is “the use or introduction of automatic equipment in a manufacturing or

other process or facility.”37 In other words, any process which is achieved by a machine of any sort, rather

than a human, can be considered automated.

A constant within capitalism is its tendency towards efficiency and productivity. When a process

originally performed by a human can be automated, that human loses her job. Economist Wassily Leontief

suggested in 1983 that “the role of humans as the most important factor of production is bound to

diminish,”38 as a result of automation essentially making human labour more expensive (relatively) and

thus increasingly redundant. However, as many critics of the automation theory will argue, this process

of automation has occurred consistently throughout history, and humanity has always found new and

innovative ways to employ human labour. Indeed, as the National Academy of Sciences stated in 1987,

“technological change frequently leads to increases in output demand… which [in turn] requires more

37 Oxford English Dictionary, ‘Automation’, 2011, http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/13468?redirectedFrom=automation&, (accessed 15/02/17). 38 Leontief, W., ‘National Perspective: The Definition of Problems and Opportunities’, in The Long-Term Impact of Technology on Employment and Unemployment, White, R. M. et al (eds.), Washington (DC), US, National Academy of Engineering, 1983, p. 3.

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labour.”39 The argument is as follows: as production is automated, it becomes cheaper, demand is

widened to a greater market, and human labour is needed to ‘fill in the gaps’ of this increased demand.

In this way, technological improvement and automation actually leads to more human jobs being created.

To suggest otherwise is to regressively adhere to an outdated economic system, rather than affirming

technology and the beneficial role it can play. The example of the Luddites is often brought up, who

attempted to fight back against the tide of mechanisation in nineteenth century England’s textile industry,

and failed. A similar situation is playing out in modern times; to thrive, according to this argument, we

must affirm automation and look for solutions which are invariably there.

However, there is a key difference between previous technological innovations and the current one;

a key difference which the previous argument does not consider. This difference is that automation is now

not limited to specific scenarios such as making textiles with machinery, or replacing horses with

tractors40. Instead, all labour can be replaced by automation. Manual, intellectual, even creative work will

soon be automatable. Even now, poetry written by robots is difficult to distinguish from human-written

poetry.41 Automation means human labour universally loses its utility. As a result, when a person’s job is

appropriated by a robot, even if this creates a new job, a robot will likely take up that one too.

Furthermore, the promise of greater demand resulting from greater productivity is not even entirely

plausible. It is true that as output increases, products are made available to more people and in greater

quantities. Yet, as Keynes argues, this process – the elasticity of demand – is not infinitely applicable. He

suggests that, as production increases and prices fall, demand certainly increases for a while (and at

39 Cyert, R. M. and Mowery, D. C. (eds.), Technology and Employment: Innovation and Growth in the U.S. Economy, Washington (DC), US, National Academy Press, 1987, https://www.nap.edu/catalog/1004/technology-and-employment-innovation-and-growth-in-the-us-economy, (accessed 16/02/17), p. 2. 40 Which not only decreased horses’ usefulness, but also the usefulness of humans in the specific industry of breeding horses. 41 Although not yet impossible, especially for the trained eye – Siegel, R., ‘Human or Machine: Can You Tell Who Wrote These Poems’, 2016, http://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/06/27/480639265/human-or-machine-can-you-tell-who-wrote-these-poems, (accessed 16/02/17).

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different rates depending on the industry).42 Yet eventually, he argues, all demand is satiated, and an

increase in production is not followed by an increase in demand.43 William Nordhaus backs up this claim,

giving the example of lighting having become much more efficient and cheap since the age of candles, yet

demand has increased only marginally.44 Even if demand migrates from one industry to another, Keynes

argues that eventually demand itself will be satiated, when the utility of acquiring more and more goods

finally plateaus. It is true, as Marxists and capitalists alike would point out, that demand can be artificially

created. Yet arguably not indefinitely and, as mentioned previously, this demand would likely be filled

merely by more automation due to the latter’s flexible applicability. The automation process is also likely

to accelerate in the coming years, to the point where 30% and 38% of UK and US jobs respectively are at

‘high risk’ of being automated by 2030.45 So, clearly, automation is an issue which presents a very real

economic threat to human labour.

Furthermore, the process of technological improvement is likely to increase wealth inequality far

beyond its already high levels. This is because it will result in accelerating the global monopolisation of

industries. Larger companies are likely to be able to automate their production far more rapidly than

smaller ones, at which point the huge efficiency increase gained from automation will drive many

companies out of business. Another result of technological advances is the breaking down of many

traditional barriers. Sherwin Rosen in 1981 identified this phenomenon, arguing that “relatively small

numbers of people [can] earn enormous amounts of money”46 as a result of ‘Superstardom’, whereby any

small increase in perceived quality can lead to a domination of a market due to barriers being broken

42 Keynes, J. M., ‘Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren’, from Essays in Persuasion, New York, US, W. W. Norton, 1963, pp. 358-373. 43 Ibid. 44 Nordhaus, W. D., ‘Do Real Output and Real Wage Measures Capture Reality? The History of Lighting Suggests Not’, Cowles Foundation for Research in Economics at Yale University, (Cowles Foundation Paper no. 957), 1998. 45 PWC, ‘Consumer Spending Prospects and the Impact of Automation on Jobs’, UK Economic Outlook Report March 2017, 2017, http://www.pwc.co.uk/services/economics-policy/insights/uk-economic-outlook.html, (accessed 10/04/2017). 46 Rosen, S., ‘The Economics of Superstars’, The American Economic Review, vol. 71, no. 5, 1981, p. 845.

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down. For example, products can now be flown or, more crucially, digitally streamed or downloaded to

distant locations for miniscule prices in comparison to previous eras. Geographical, linguistic and other

barriers can be almost entirely circumvented as a result of globalisation and technological innovations.

This is why certain movies, for instance, can dominate culture and earn billions, whereas their traditional

counterparts – plays – were seen by a few thousand people at most.

The result of these processes, which collectively can be called ‘automated globalisation’, is that many

people will be – and already are being – made unemployed. Indeed, it is conceivable that every job will be

automated at some point, and probably within two centuries, as a result of accelerating automation

technology. Simultaneously, fewer and fewer companies will survive, leaving those that do – and the

owners of them – with enormous profits and market control. Amazon, for example, could conceivably

control all of the retail market. The owners would not actually perform a role within the company, other

than owner, because any job including management would be performed better when automated. Thus,

in a fully automated economy, almost nobody will own either a job or a business, and those that do will

merely ‘own’, and not work in any tangible sense. We shall call those without a job the ‘non-owners’, and

the owners, predictably, the ‘owners’.

This situation clearly has some grave implications for liberty. First, and most obviously, the economic

freedom of the non-owners will be severely curtailed. Without a source of income, individuals will have

no ability to sustain themselves or their dependents, let alone enjoy the relative luxury to which most are

accustomed in modern society. Second, political freedom will be de facto restricted to the owners. This is

because the enormous economic influence they will hold will effectively allow them to dictate political

decision making. This societal cleavage is reminiscent of Marx’s claim that, under capitalism, “the whole

of society must fall apart into the two classes of the property owners and the propertyless workers.”47

47 Marx, K., (1844), ‘Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts’, in McLellan, D. (ed.), Karl Marx: Selected Writings, 2nd edn., Oxford, UK, Oxford University Press, 2000, p. 85.

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Under automated capitalism, the split will be between the property owners and the propertyless non-

workers instead.

Conclusion

There are, broadly, two responses to the threats posed by automation. Under capitalism there is

always an incentive to making production more efficient – profit. Therefore, unless governments

undertake substantial intervention, automation is unavoidable. Furthermore, avoiding it is not even

necessarily desirable, as an automated society could bring many benefits, such as much more leisure time

and greater prosperity, if its threats were adequately dealt with. This chapter has established what kind

of society we want to live in, and why liberty is indispensable to a just society. It has also extensively

explored the threat which automation poses to liberty in a future society. We have, thus, established our

research question: how should a society respond to the threat of automation to liberty. The first solution

is the universal basic income, or UBI. This is a regular grant provided to every citizen in a country designed

to allow for a basic standard of living and alleviate the issues of unemployment. The second solution is

known as ‘fully automated luxury communism’, or FALC. This is a more radical alternative to the UBI, in

which the capitalist economic system is replaced with a communistic arrangement, sharing the means of

production equally across the society. The next two chapters will be devoted to analysing each of these

alternatives in turn to determine which is the better method by which to tackle the problems of

automation.

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Chapter Two: Universal Basic Income

Introduction

This chapter will analyse in depth the concept of a universal basic income, exploring to what extent

it is capable of solving the issues of liberty created by economic automation. Firstly, I shall discuss the

fundamentals of the basic income, what it purports to achieve, and arguments in support of its

implementation, particularly those focussing on its capacity to safeguard and expand societal freedom. I

will then discuss the practical issues surrounding the basic income - including the problems of impersonal

welfare and motivation for work – finding that they are not sufficient to derail the efficacy of basic income

policies, particularly in an automated-economy setting. However, I will then go on to posit several deeper,

theoretical critiques of the UBI’s ability to truly address issues of liberty. These will include the following

arguments. First, the owners’ have an incentive to keep the UBI rate as low as possible. Second, the UBI

entrenches dependency and thus necessarily limits freedom, an argument informed by a reading of

Rousseau. Third, that exploitation originates in the mode of production and thus cannot be tackled solely

through redistributive efforts such as the UBI. Fourth, a reading of Mauss’s and Derrida’s conception of

the gift in relation to the UBI, arguing it can never truly break free of the power relations characteristic of

all redistribution. I will conclude by arguing that these critiques mean that, rather than fulfilling its promise

of emancipating society, the UBI will in fact serve to entrench unequal power distributions and thus fail

to promote liberty maximally.

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Arguments for the UBI

Firstly, however, we must lay out the basic principles of the UBI and the prominent arguments in its favour.

The UBI, as mentioned previously, broadly describes a scheme in which a society redistributes wealth so

as to provide each of its citizens with a basic source of income on which they can subsist. As Parijs notes,

it need not necessarily be a ‘basic’ income in terms of being the bare minimum, but instead ‘basic’ in the

sense that it is the “basis to which all other incomes can be added.”48

Parijs is a prominent supporter of the UBI, primarily for its ability to grant what he calls ‘real freedom’

to citizens. Parijs’s explicit reference to liberty is clearly highly relevant to our discussion. As a result, I will

briefly lay out his argument. Parijs starts in much the same way as this dissertation; he attempts to

understand in what a just society would consist. He concludes, acknowledging his debt to Rawls, that a

just society is one which is maximally free; that is, one which maximises the freedom of its least-free

citizen.49 He distinguishes ‘real’ freedom from formal freedom, arguing that formal freedom protects the

“security [and] self-ownership”50 of its citizens, without guaranteeing the means or opportunity for them

to benefit from these freedoms.51 This is reminiscent of our earlier contention with Mill, where freedoms

are granted without the freedom of choice to act upon them. Thus, Parijs advocates ‘real’ freedom as a

measure which takes into account the formal possibilities and the practical means of its citizens maximally

being able to do “what one might want to do.”52

Parijs then goes on to discuss the practical implications of this conception of a just society. He argues

that in order to secure ‘real-freedom-for-all’, we must “go for the highest unconditional income for all

48 Parijs, P. V., Real Freedom for All: What (if anything) can justify capitalism?, Oxford, UK, Oxford University Press, 1995, p. 30, (my itals.). 49 Ibid., p. 25. 50 Ibid., p. 23. 51 Ibid. 52 Ibid., p. 4.

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consistent with security and self-ownership.”53 He follows that a universal basic income, one which

provides the ability to live – whether via cash or through another more efficient method – to everyone is

the best way of ensuring this kind of free society. This is because this system amalgamates the best parts

of communist and capitalist systems to provide for the least well off – a la communism – whilst still

providing a high average level of (economic) prosperity and freedom – a la capitalism.

Parijs’s argument, when applied to an automated society, seems even more appealing. If, as we have

discussed, automation is likely to deprive the vast majority of citizens of a means of subsistence, then

clearly a new institutional method is needed to secure the needs of those citizens. Parijs’s suggestion

simply posits that we should prioritise freedom when formulating this method, a position with which this

dissertation concurs.

Karl Widerquist also agrees with Parijs, yet approaches the problem of UBI and its relationship to

freedom from a different angle. His article Who Exploits Who? explores the critics of UBI, such as

Donselaar, who argue that the UBI constitutes an exploitation of those who earn by those who do not.

Parijs generally ignores this criticism, citing his commitment to overall freedom, whether or not certain

freedoms are overlooked for this greater good. Widerquist, however, takes Donselaar’s critique more

seriously. He suggests that, rather than the recipients of UBI exploiting the providers, in reality the UBI

merely corrects the exploitation which occurs under capitalism. Essentially, Widerquist posits that under

capitalism, those who do not produce as much quantitative value – in terms of GDP54 - nevertheless still

provide qualitative value in their ‘passive contributions’ to production, such as their “loss of access to the

non-commercial use of assets55… [and the] acceptance of law,”56 both of which facilitate production.

Furthermore, another ‘passive contribution’ which Widerquist acknowledges is the sacrifice of the “power

53 Parijs, P. V., Real Freedom for All, Oxford University Press, 1995, p. 4. 54 Gross domestic product; as a method of measuring an individual’s input of value into an economy. 55 For instance, the loss of access to public land which has been turned into a private farm. 56 Widerquist, K., ‘Who Exploits Who?’, Political Studies, vol. 54, no. 1, 2006, p. 445.

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to say no.”57 He argues that, under capitalism, citizens are often obligated to work in order to subsist, and

are thus vulnerable and have no capacity to “reject exploitative offers.”58 This represents an exploitation

of the citizen, and Widerquist argues that the UBI returns an individual’s right to say no and thus to choose

to a different, non-exploitative mode of living.59 In an automated society, a manifested UBI would

represent an acknowledgment of the ‘passive contributions’ of citizens who do not own the means of

production. It would grant the m the freedom to reject exploitation and to live a life they desired; a clear

gain for liberty. Furthermore, it would also tacitly acknowledge the lack of a tangible distinction between

owners and non-owners, as neither actually produce and thus both deserve at least a certain level of

subsistence.

Erik Olin Wright puts forward a similar argument in support of the UBI. He suggests that, under

capitalism, the power of capital is far greater than that of labour, and thus owners dominate workers. The

UBI serves to rebalance this dichotomy, improving “the bargaining position of individual workers.”60 He

also suggests it will decommodify labour, reducing the capability of work to be merely wage labour.61 In

the setting of an automated capitalist economy, the UBI would improve the bargaining position of the

non-owner, and aid in the elimination of the then outdated62 concept of human labour as a commodity.

There is also significant feminist support for the UBI. This is because it rewards labour that is largely

unpaid, such as caregiving, homemaking, and emotional labour – all roles traditionally performed by

women. Society recognises this work as valuable in its implementation of the UBI, rewarding each

individual equally regardless of gender. Almaz Zelleke argues that the UBI would serve to “institutionalise

57 Widerquist, Who Exploits Who?, Political Studies, p. 458. 58 Ibid. 59 Ibid. 60 Wright, E. O., ‘Basic Income as a Socialist Project’, paper presented at the annual US-BIG Congress, University of Wisconsin, 2005, p. 3. 61 Ibid. 62 Outdated because labour cannot be a commodity if it isn’t valuable to society, having been replaced by automation.

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the universal caretaker,”63 normalising a diversity of life choices rather than maintaining gendered labour

roles. Furthermore, the UBI has the potential to mitigate the loss of identity felt by male workers under

an automated economic system. Traditional gender roles hold men as the ‘breadwinners’ who support

their family financially. Thus, the inevitable loss of jobs is likely to lead to a male identity crisis where they

cannot fulfil this role. The UBI serves to mitigate this issue by recognising the value of all societal

contributions, whilst simultaneously breaking down the assumption that, in a post-scarcity era, one must

still labour for subsistence. Economic redistribution in the form of welfare will no longer be stigmatised

(because all citizens will receive it unconditionally). In this way, the UBI will assist in the changing of

perceptions towards a more gender-neutral conception of work and provision. In terms of liberty, this

change will be valuable in that individuals will not be pressured into conforming to a gendered role within

society, freeing them to pursue their particular conception of the good life.

Practical Examples and Popular Criticism

The UBI has been trialled in small-scale experiments in various countries. For instance, a trial of the

UBI in Manitoba, Canada – one of the earliest of its kind – was conducted in the 1970s with some

success.64,65 Similar UBI experiments have been carried out in Iran,66 Alaska,67 and various other places,

with mixed results. The UBI has seen an increase in popularity in recent years – particularly following the

2008 financial crisis – although it has thus failed to manifest itself seriously in any nation’s policy. Despite

63 Zelleke, A., ‘Institutionalizing the Universal Caretaker Through a Basic Income’, Basic Income Studies, vol. 3, no. 3, 2008, p. 7. 64 Hum, D. and Simpson, W., ‘Income maintenance, work effort, and the Canadian Mincome experiment’, University of Manitoba Dataverse, 2017, doi:10.5203/FK2/JWVHEJ, (accessed 13/03/2017). 65 The experiment did not greatly demotivate subjects to work, and in some cases allowed single parents to work less whilst still supporting their dependents. 66 Basic Income Earth Network, http://basicincome.org/topic/iran/, (accessed 13/03/2017). 67 Basic Income Earth Network, http://basicincome.org/topic/alaska/, (accessed 13/03/2017).

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this, its popularity can be partially68 explained by a growing popular realisation that automation is already

rendering neoliberal, anti-welfare policies irrelevant (and dangerous to displaced workers).

However, the UBI’s popularity is by no means unanimous. Switzerland held the world’s first national

referendum on the basic income in 2016, yet failed to pass it – with nearly 77% of citizens voting against.69

In 2010, a commission of the German parliament discussed the UBI, concluding that it was unworkable

for various reasons.70 This kind of opposition demonstrates the UBI is not yet ubiquitous. However, as the

process of automation continues and an increasing number of jobs are lost, it is conceivable that support

for a basic income will increase. Many of the general objections levelled at it, for instance, are irrelevant

in the context of a largely or fully automated economy.

One of these objections is that the UBI doesn’t acknowledge the differing needs of citizens. For

example, a person with large medical bills, or a disability, are (in theory) catered for in a welfare state

which means-tests its allowances. With UBI everyone is given the same, despite different people needing

different levels of aid due to their varying needs. However, the solution to this issue lies in Parijs’s

definition of ‘basic’ as the base income, on top of which additional benefits could be granted to those in

need. If the UBI system were implemented in a truly Parijsian manner, it would distribute freedom –

because the goal is freedom, and resource distribution is merely a means to that end – maximally,

meaning those most restricted by their condition would be gifted the most. There is the question of how

efficiently this redistribution can be implemented in practice, although the same could be asked of all

redistributive measures (including our contemporary ones).

68 Alternative explanations include the other issues currently plaguing capitalism, such as globalisation, which were discussed in Chapter One, ‘The Future of Liberty and Economic Unfreedom’, pp. 12-15. 69 BBC News, ‘Switzerland’s voters reject basic income plan’, 5 June 2016, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36454060, (accessed 14/03/2017). 70 Deutscher Bundestag, ‘Problematic impact on labour incentives: report on the petition for the introduction of an unconditional basic income’, 8 November 2010, https://www.bundestag.de/dokumente/textarchiv/2010/31904334_kw45_pa_petitionen/203030, (accessed 14/03/2017).

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Another primary concern is that of reduced motivation to work as a result of the UBI. Clearly this

objection is irrelevant in an economy where human labour is of little worth anyway.

However, perhaps the considerable opposition to the UBI runs deeper than practical concerns. Is it

possible that citizens can already see some incompatibilities between the UBI and true liberty? Whether

or not popular opposition to the UBI is grounded in these concerns, this dissertation will contend that

there are several serious issues with the UBI and its capability to solve the issue of liberty in an automated

economy.

Marx, Althusser, and the Incentives of the Owners

The first issue I identify is that, under a fully automated economy with the UBI system, the owners

have a clear incentive to keep the basic income allowance as low as possible. As the ones who (nominally)

produce all of society’s wealth, it is in their material interest to attempt to retain as much of their income

as possible. It is also reasonable to assume that they will hold the authority to achieve this. As society’s

nominal providers, the owners are likely to wield enormous political influence. Any policy which does not

benefit them in some way will fail to receive funding, meaning all of government will essentially revolve

around the whims of these few individuals. The only concern that they will hold, in relation to the non-

owning masses, is to prevent revolution which might deprive them of the means of production – the

source of their power. Thus, they must provide some kind of UBI-style allowance; enough so as to ensure

non-owners believe that they hold a tolerable level of liberty. This is likely to be relatively low, as all that

is needed is an allowance which just about staves off revolution.

However, as Gramsci notes, revolutions (and indeed the general mechanisms of history) are not

solely propelled by material concerns or realities. They are, instead, affected by a complex interaction

between the various elements of the base and superstructure – the economic and the non-economic

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sections of society, respectively - working in unison.71 Althusser furthers this notion with his concept of

ideological state apparatuses, or ISAs. These ISAs are institutions such as education, religion, and the

media, which can be harnessed by the state to affect the mindset of the proletariat; in our case, the non-

owners. Althusser, deferring to Marx, posits that an economic system must, along with producing, also

reproduce its means of production.72 In order to achieve this, it must first continually reproduce the

productive forces which enable the means of production to function and reproduce: labour power. Labour

power is reproduced through wages, which in turn allow the workers to live, work, and reproduce

themselves. 73 These wages are set at the lowest possible level to satisfy biological needs and, crucially,

the cultural expectations of the working class – what Althusser calls “the needs of a historical minimum.”74

This is where Althusser argues the ISAs are utilised; they fulfil the role of “the reproduction of the relations

of production, i.e. of capitalist relations of exploitation.”75 In other words, ISAs can be utilised to shape

the cultural expectations of the working class to allow for a reduction in their wages, to be as close as

possible to the biologically necessary minimum. Thus, in this view, wages (as well as all other forms of

allowance including welfare) are simply methods to reproduce the forces of production. In an automated

economy, those ‘forces of production’ – having foregone human labour power – become simply the

prevention of a revolution which would disrupt production. The lack of a revolution, per se, is the only

social force needed for production. The consequence of this is that the owners will operate the ISAs under

their control in order to manipulate the self-perceived needs of the non-owners to be as low as possible

whilst preventing a revolution. If we are to accept Althusser’s argument that these apparatuses are

immensely powerful, the non-owners’ ‘needs’ could be set very low indeed. These very low needs would

71 Gramsci, A., (1917), ‘The Revolution Against Capital’, in Forgacs, D. (ed.), The Gramsci Reader: Selected Writings 1916-1935, New York, US, New York University Press, 2000. 72 Althusser, L., ‘Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses (Notes towards an Investigation)’, in Lenin and Philosophy and other Essays, Brewster, B. (trans.), New York, Monthly Review Press, 1971, p. 128. 73 Ibid., p. 130. 74 Ibid., p. 131. 75 Ibid., p. 154, (my itals).

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constitute a very low UBI allowance – and consequently a low level of liberty for the masses. Clearly, then,

liberty is not likely to be distributed maximally in an automated society sustained by a UBI.

Rousseau and Dependence

The next issue I shall address with the UBI’s capacity to maximise liberty in an automated economy

is its tendency to create a (material and psychological) dependency of the non-owners on the owners.

Rousseau, in his Discourse on the Origins of Inequality, argues that individuals in the state of nature were

sympathetic nomads who were free and healthy and whose “modest needs… [were] easily found to

hand.”76 However, he argues, as soon as “one man needed the help of another,” 77 an unequal power

dynamic began to develop and social and economic inequality proliferated. This inequality and

dependence was entrenched through the division of labour and, crucially, through the invention of

property.78 This dependence simultaneously rid the majority of the natural freedom which individuals

possessed in the state of nature, and eliminated their capacity to achieve civil freedom (because they

could not contribute meaningfully to society’s continuation or improvement due to their constant

dependency). Thus, a society which is built on the dependence of one group on another can never truly

foster freedom. Moreover, a society based largely on property inevitably develops these unequal

relationships of dependency; such a society is characterised by subjugation. Interestingly, Rousseau

suggests that not just the poor, but everyone in society – including the rich – are deprived of their freedom

in this scenario.79 The (material and psychological) dependency of the rich on the services of the poor, and

76 Rousseau, J. J., ‘Discourse on the Origin of Inequality’ (1755), in Rousseau: The Basic Political Writings, Cress, D. A. (trans., ed.), Indianapolis, US, Hackett Publishing, 1987, p. 46. 77 Ibid., p. 65. 78 Ibid., pp. 66-67. 79 Ibid., p. 67.

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of the poor on the aid of the rich, means that both are slaves to their societal position.80 Only by breaking

free of these relationships of dependency can individuals be truly free.

What, then, can we glean from Rousseau’s analysis of dependency for our own question of

automation and the UBI? First of all, it seems clear that the UBI fulfils both of Rousseau’s key criteria for

unfreedom: property and dependency. Under the UBI, the owners of the means of production do precisely

that: they own the property which produces their wealth. And because this wealth is also the only wealth

created in society, it must be distributed in some way; in this case, via the UBI. This redistribution creates

an inherent relationship of dependency. Furthermore, the non-owners are not only materially dependent

on the owners (for subsistence), but also psychologically dependent on them. This psychological

dependence is fuelled by an artificial dichotomy of creators and consumers; of the deserving and

undeserving. This inhibits the freedom of the non-owners profoundly, as their entire self-conception is

defined by their insecure and changeable relationship with their owner-benefactors. They are analogous

with the beggar who has no autonomy to provide for herself and must constantly rely on the charity of

others. Clearly then, the UBI not only fails to provide true freedom, but in fact entrenches and

institutionalises the relationships of material and psychological dependence which produce unfreedom.

Marx and Relations of Production

A further issue with the UBI’s capacity to produce liberty is its failure to acknowledge that production

and distribution are not independent of one another, and that inequality and exploitation must be tackled

in both these spheres. Marx, in Grundrisse, argues that economists and non-economists alike

conceptualise production and distribution as related but entirely distinct and independent spheres.81 They

are understood as chronological steps in an economic cycle, yet are nevertheless “removed from and

80 Rousseau, J. J., Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, Hackett Publishing, 1987, p. 67. 81 Marx, K., Grundrisse (1857), Nicolaus, M. (trans.), London, UK, Penguin Books, 1993, p. 96.

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quasi-independent”82 of each other. This allows capitalists such as David Ricardo to ignore the constitutive

effects of production on distribution (and vice-versa), meaning production can be left unmolested by

questions of socio-economic justice.83 However, Marx contends that, in actuality, distribution not only

affects production, but is also an integral part within it. Distribution is not merely the distribution of

products, but also “the distribution of the instruments of production.”84 So inequality and exploitation

present themselves at the very beginning of the economic cycle, depending on to who the means of

production are ‘distributed’. In a capitalistic system, they are inherited genealogically or on the basis of

acquisition, meaning the masses (with no capital or inheritance) are immediately disadvantaged.

Marx furthers this critique in Das Kapital Vol. 3, arguing that relations of production and distribution

are not “natural relations,”85 but instead arise from “a specific historical determinacy.”86 Specifically, they

are determined by the one fundamental law of production: to produce surplus-value. As a result, the form

distribution takes will always be that which allows for the generation of the most capital possible in the

realm of production.87 Thus, any attempt to tackle injustice (or, in our case, a deficit of liberty) directed

solely at distribution will ultimately fail – because injustice is determined by relations of production, and

the distribution (of the means of production) within production.

This demonstrates the fundamental (economic) issue with the UBI as a means of producing a free

society. The fact is that a free society cannot be produced without analysing – and dismantling – the

relations of production which are the origins of unfreedom. As the UBI is exclusively a redistributive effort,

it cannot truly combat inequality in production. Indeed, in an automated economy it may actually serve

to reinforce the relations of production which produce inequality, by replacing distribution - in the form

82 Marx, K., Grundrisse, Penguin Books, 1993, p. 96. 83 Ibid., p. 95. 84 Ibid., p. 96. 85 Marx, K., Capital Vol. 3 (1894), Fernbach, D. (trans.), London, UK, Penguin Books, 1991, p. 1017. 86 Ibid., p. 1018. 87 Ibid., pp. 1020-21.

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of wages and purchases - with distribution in the form of welfare, thereby allowing inequality to filter

through the economy, from production to consumption, unhindered. Clearly then, if a society wishes to

rid itself of exploitation and establish itself as maximally free, it must eliminate exploitation wherever it is

produced; whether in the realms of production, or distribution, or most likely both. This cannot be

achieved through the UBI alone.

Mauss, Derrida, and the UBI as a ‘Gift’

The final critique I will level at the UBI’s capacity to produce and protect liberty is informed by

readings of Mauss’s and Derrida’s conception of ‘the gift’. Using these readings, I contend that transparent

redistributive efforts such as the UBI always carry with them an unequal power dynamic which restricts

liberty. This critique is, in a way, the counterpart to the previous one: there I primarily questioned the

inequality of freedom produced in relations of production; here I examine the relations of distribution to

identify its flawed deliverance of freedom, and to show how the UBI fails in both the productive and

distribute spheres to secure maximal liberty.

Mauss’s essay The Gift is an examination of the gift-giving economies of pre-modern societies - which

are indeed still extant in some indigenous populations. He points out that Western anthropologists had

previously characterised gift-giving in these societies as merely supplementary forms of otherwise

‘rational’ exchange.88 He argues that this characterisation is an imposition of capitalist values onto pre-

modern societies and that, in fact, gift-giving in these societies was the primary form of exchange. Indeed,

as Mauss notes, the Haïda tribe throw away “copper objects and money”89 so as not to associate

themselves with market commodities. Douglass, in her foreword to Mauss’s essay, notes that gift-giving

88 Mauss, M. (1925), The Gift: The form and reason for exchange in archaic societies, Halls, W. D. (trans.), London, UK, Routledge, 1990, p. 6. 89 Ibid., p. 95.

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is not simply a form of “voluntary, unrequited surrender of resources”90 as it is traditionally conceived. It

instead represents an agonistic relationship where giving and receiving is obligatory and competitive, and

whose purpose is to form strong social bonds between individuals and groups, and to establish a social

hierarchy.91 92 93 Mauss can be critiqued for relying too heavily on the tribes of the Pacific Northwest, who

engage in this form of competitive gift-giving94 only because of their unusually abundant surroundings

which make subsistence unnecessary and traditional economic exchange irrelevant. However, when

applied to automated economies, this critique is actually reversed. Mauss’s work demonstrates that, even

in scenarios of abundance (such as in the Pacific Northwest, or in a post-scarcity automated society),

exchange is still characterised by competition and power.

Derrida’s argument in Given Time can be understood as a continuation of Mauss’s. He argues, as

Mauss himself acknowledged95, that Mauss’s text deals with exchanging things which are nominally gifts,

but are in reality anything but gifts (at least in the traditional sense of a one-way, unrequited exchange).96

This is because all so-called gifts carry with them an expectation of return. Derrida, similarly to Bataille,

suggests that the act of return always involves an ‘excess’, because the exact gift received cannot be

returned, and any other gift cannot possibly hold the exact value of the previous gift: “this ‘happy medium’

is… impossible.”97 A gift is always either considered too small or too great; in either case, there is a deficit

of value which extends infinitely, binding the two parties in an endless power-dynamic.

90 Douglass, M., ‘Foreword’, in Mauss, M., The Gift, Routledge, 1990, p. ix. 91 Mauss, M., Ibid., pp. 16-18, (On obligatory reciprocity). 92 Ibid., p. 76, (On social bonds). 93 Ibid., p. 95, (On hierarchy). 94 Such as the ‘Putlach’ (or Potlatch) – a gift-giving feast which represents the tribe’s principal economic exchange mechanism. 95 Mauss, M., The Gift, Routledge, 1990, p. 3. 96 Derrida, J., Given Time: 1. Counterfeit Money, Kamuf, P. (trans.), Chicago, US, University of Chicago Press, 1992, p. 24. 97 Ibid., p. 65.

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How is this relevant to our question? In a broad sense, a gift is anything which ostensibly requires no

return. The UBI is just this; a contribution made by the owners of capital to those who do not own capital.

Its very nature expects no return; the receivers are not expected to reciprocate the gift, or labour for it,

or indeed even give thanks for it. Thus, the UBI is, in every sense, a gift. However, (and perhaps as a result)

it is subject to the same shortcomings of gifts to which Derrida points. It is not anonymous, and thus both

the giver and receiver know of the gift-giving and who benefits. Yet, in this case, the non-owners can do

nothing to reciprocate the ‘generosity’ of the gift. It is analogous to giving grace to God; it seems

inadequate to do so, because the ‘gift’ of thanks is of such lesser value vis-à-vis the original gift. This gift,

from the owners as from God, is nothing less than life itself. As a result, the receiver is always in a state of

inadequacy in relation to the giver. The giver takes on a Godly quality, always and infinitely superior to

the receiver. This relationship, crucially, is evident to both parties. The non-owner is constantly indebted

to the owner, and consequently is obligated to place the opinions and actions of the owner as superior to

theirs. This is because, if one is to accept the gift of the UBI, one must also accept the hierarchy of power

which inevitably accompanies an unreturnable gift. The result of this for liberty is fatal; one cannot live

the life one desires without feeling a constant psychological bias towards the desires of the life-givers, i.e.

the owners. This means that one’s actions (and self-perceptions of those actions) are always corrupted,

skewed towards another; never truly free. Ultimately then, any system in which unequal, unreciprocable

distribution occurs cannot promote a true form of liberty for the receivers of the distribution/gift. Thus,

the UBI cannot secure maximal freedom, as it always carries with it an obligation of deference and duty

to the givers – the owners of the means of production.

Conclusion

In conclusion, this chapter has examined the UBI as a method of alleviating the problems for liberty

created by an automated economy. It firstly defined the UBI and the arguments of its proponents (Parijs

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and Widerquist, among others). Next, it examined some practical applications of the UBI, its increasing

popularity, and some common objections to it. It then posited four distinct arguments against the UBI’s

capacity to promote liberty: that it contains an incentive for the owners to limit the UBI as much as

possible; that it necessarily puts the non-owners in a state of dependence; that it ignores the issues of

inequality in relations of production; and that it carries an irreconcilable power-dynamic as a ‘gift’ to the

non-owners from the owners. For all these reasons, I believe the UBI is an inadequate solution to the

problem of liberty in an automated society, and indeed, in many cases, it actually entrenches unfreedom.

Consequently, we must theorize a better solution to truly secure maximal liberty in an automated society.

The next chapter will be devoted to analysing such a solution – fully automated luxury communism.

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Chapter Three: Fully Automated Luxury Communism

Introduction

This final chapter will be dedicated to analysing what can be considered a superior method of

securing liberty: fully automated luxury communism, or FALC, a term originally devised by Aaron Bastani.

Initially, FALC seems relatively similar to a UBI-style system. They both exist within an automated

economy, in which human labour has lost its value and, thus, the vast majority do not work for

subsistence. They both offer a certain amount of guaranteed resources to the members of a society,

allowing them to live and perhaps achieve acceptable living standards. However, the key defining

difference between the UBI and FALC lies in the relations of production. Specifically, it lies in who owns

the means of production: under UBI, the original capitalist owners of business own them; whereas, in

FALC, everyone participates in shared ownership of the means of production. This seems like a relatively

small difference, at least when considering the seemingly similar outcomes the two methods secure; in

both systems, the masses still receive a form of the ‘basic income’. On the contrary, however, the

difference constitutes a huge shift in the possibilities for securing liberty in society.

This chapter will begin by demonstrating how exactly FALC produces maximal liberty: firstly, through

its diffusion of wealth; and secondly through its establishment of community. Next, I shall briefly show

how the issues which damage the UBI’s capacity for producing liberty – covered in the previous chapter –

are overcome by FALC. I will then explore whether the need for violent revolution compromises FALC’s

stated aim of liberty, using a reading of Žižek’s conception of violence to answer in the negative. Finally, I

shall discuss Nozick’s argument that patterned forms of justice violate the freedoms of individuals, using

Cohen’s response to contend that they do not. The chapter will conclude, in light of these previous

arguments, that FALC is the most effective method of achieving maximal liberty in an automated society.

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Wealth Dispersal, Community, and Maximal Liberty

So, in what ways does FALC secure maximal liberty? Firstly, and most obviously, FALC has the capacity

to produce more freedom for individuals, as well as for the least-free individual, simply because it spreads

wealth more equally than the UBI. It is reasonable to assume that liberty does not increase at the same

rate as one gains wealth. At a certain level of wealth, the rate at which opportunities become available

slows dramatically. For example, in our current economy, somebody earning £100,000 per year has vastly

more choices in life available to them than someone earning £20,000. Yet, according to the same ration

of 5:1 somebody who earns £20,000,000 a year is not significantly deprived of choice compared to

someone earning £100,000,000. As a result of this inverse exponentiality, the more equally wealth is

spread, the more liberty is produced overall. Thus, FALC produces more liberty than the UBI, as well as

spreading it maximally.

Additionally, there is a benefit to FALC’s inherent equality which is more fundamental than the

improvement of liberty through material means. This is the idea that equality per se increases the level of

liberty in a society. This argument proceeds from Cohen’s refutation of Rawls’s ‘difference principle’; the

notion that inequality is acceptable as long as it improves the lot of the least well-off individual. A popular

conception of this is Ronald Reagan’s (and others’) trickle-down economics which, although widely

disproved98 99, rested on the same logic of inequality benefiting everyone. However, Cohen argues that,

regardless of whether it improves the material wealth of the worst off, inequality is still bad. He suggests

that the incentives argument violates Rawls’s commitment to community, or what Rawls’s calls “the ties

of civic friendship.”100 101 Essentially, by exchanging equality for a harder work ethic, one sacrifices the

98 Galbraith, J. K., ‘Recession Economics’, New York Review of Books, vol. 29, no. 1, 1982. 99 Sowell, T., ‘Trickle Down theory and tax cuts for the rich’, Hoover Institution Press, no. 635, 2012, pp. 1-17. 100 Rawls, J., A Theory of Justice, 1971, p. 536. 101 Cohen, G. A., Rescuing Justice and Equality, Cambridge, US, Harvard University Press, 2008, p. 45.

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sense of community.102 Community is necessarily sacrificed because inequality, by definition, produces

differences between people which reduce their capacity for mutual relation or empathy. This sense of

community – for both Cohen and Rawls – is, however, essential to a just society, meaning its loss also

constitutes the loss of a perfectly just society. Furthermore, Cohen argues that the acceptance of the

incentives argument also represents an acceptance of a society in which competition and individualism

are paramount.103 So, to deny the value of equality is to deny the value of community, as well as to affirm

the establishment, strengthening, and perpetuation a society resembling a competitive market. It is

reasonable to assume that losing this sense of community – along with what Cohen calls the ‘egalitarian

ethos’ – would harm individuals’ capacity for working together, as trust (or any genuine sense of helping

others) would be difficult to establish. As a result, the freedom to do things which require cooperation

would be diminished. Thus, equality per se produces freedom, by fostering community and cooperation.

Even if Cohen is wrong, the argument for FALC is unharmed. This is because Rawls’s incentives

argument – that some wealth inequality incentivises harder work which in turn produces greater wealth

for all – is irrelevant when applied to an automated economy; human labour is unnecessary, and thus

need not be incentivised. Consequently, the UBI cannot provide more liberty than FALC by permitting

inequality; it can, at best, provide an equal amount. The result of this is that, specifically regarding this

issue, it is always better to establish FALC rather than the UBI – on the possibility that the egalitarian ethos

does contribute to greater societal liberty.

102 Cohen, G. A., Rescuing Justice and Equality, Harvard University Press, 2008, p. 45. 103 Ibid., p. 82.

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Overcoming the Problems of the UBI

If FALC is to show how it can secure maximal liberty in an automated economy, it must be shown

how it overcomes the issues which prevent UBI from doing the same. Firstly, then, how does it overcome

the issue of incentivising those in power to reduce distribution allowances as much as possible? Answer:

by preventing the possibility for incentives in the first place. Incentives (of this zero-sum kind) operate on

the assumption that there are various competing groups or individuals in a society, and that one party can

benefit from disadvantaging the other. This is the case under the UBI; the owners and the non-owners are

in a constant battle to secure as much wealth for their group as possible. However, in FALC, society is not

– at least fundamentally – based upon this form of overt group antagonism. Of course, various groups will

campaign to acquire funding and support for their particular conception of the good life. However, this

kind of campaigning will not threaten the right every individual has to a fair share of society’s wealth, as

the incentives inherent to the UBI are likely to do.

This reasoning also shows how FALC avoids the problem of material and psychological dependency

which Rousseau understands as a primary cause of unfreedom. If a hierarchy of groups, in which one

group is dependent on another, does not exist, then dependence ceases to be an issue. Under FALC,

individuals are dependent only on themselves and their share of the means of production; there is no

party which mediates (and can potentially distort) an individual’s access to production.

Marx’s concern with inequality generated in production also becomes irrelevant under FALC. This is

because production and distribution are assimilated; production is undertaken solely in preparation for

its (equal redistribution). No inequality is produced at the stage of production, and distribution is also

designed to be as egalitarian as possible. Therefore, FALC addresses inequality in production and

distribution, something UBI fails to achieve. This means that liberty can be maximised without the threat

of exploitation in the productive sphere.

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Finally, the Derridean fear – of distribution essentially acting as a ‘gift’ from the owners to the non-

owners, with all the hierarchical power-dynamics which such an arrangement entails – is also solved under

FALC. This is, again, because the means of production are owned equally by everyone. This means that

redistribution, in a sense, ceases to exist. The lack of inequality in production means that redistribution to

establish an acceptable level of equality in society – the ostensible purpose of welfare programs – is

unnecessary; everyone has enough already. This means that nobody is dependent on the gifts of another,

and economies of exchange (whether monetary or gift-based), which are invariably based on competition

and some level of inequality, become obsolete.

All these reasons originate in the placing of the means of production with the many instead of the

few. This change, as demonstrated, eliminates all of the issues of liberty which the UBI fails to address, or

indeed which it (in some cases) reifies further.

The Problem of Violence

There are, nevertheless, some criticisms of FALC’s capacity to promote liberty which must be taken

seriously. The first is a concern of how a society transitions from a capitalist one, where the means of

production reside with a few, to a communist one, where all possess the means of production. Two

questions arise here which I will tackle in turn. Firstly, what would this transition look like practically? And

secondly, can violence be used justifiably in such a transition?

First, the practical consideration. It is clear that a transition to FALC is likely to increase liberty overall,

and maximally so, as compared with the UBI. However, it is also likely that the owners will lose liberty.

They will certainly lose material freedom – the freedom of action which accompanies their great wealth.

This means that the owners are unlikely to relinquish their ownership of the means of production willingly,

even under considerable societal pressure. The use of force or coercion, therefore, seems an unavoidable

part of securing the transition. This raises a question about whether violence is justifiable. Initially, it

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seems difficult to support a violent overthrow of a socio-economic system. The challenges of limiting

violence as much as possible, as well as constructing a peaceful society conceived in violence, seem

immense. Furthermore, modern violent revolutions are rarely effective. Shay’s rebellion of 1786 in

America, or the German Spartacist revolt of 1919, seem to be typical of revolts which achieve little, yet

result in the deaths of thousands. Moreover, revolutions which are successful, such as the French or

Russian Revolutions, seem to be corrupted by such violence, committing atrocities which are difficult to

support, and ultimately failing to establish the kind of utopian societies which their respective proponents

envisioned. Even recent violent uprisings such as those of the Arab Spring have generally failed to achieve

positive change, and often served merely to violently destabilise states such as Libya, Egypt, and Syria.

Non-violent, gradual efforts at creating change – such as the civil rights movement in America, or labour

movements across the world – have generally been more effective at securing social justice than

spontaneous violence.

Indeed, Bastani believes FALC will emerge gradually, with reforms such as the three-day weekend

and the UBI acting as stepping-stones on the path to luxury communism.104 Crucially, he claims that a

violent or coercive uprising will be unnecessary to establish FALC.105 However, as is demonstrated in

chapter two, the issue is that the UBI serves to entrench, not deconstruct, unequal property relations,

meaning that the UBI’s introduction will likely thwart attempts to establish FALC. Moreover, even

assuming a gradual approach, there will eventually be a definite choice to be made by the owners to

relinquish control of the means of production, at which point, if they refuse, a violent revolution becomes

once again necessary. In the past, concessions have been made by those in power in order preserve their

power in some form. Yet communism demands the relinquishment of almost all (disproportionate)

104 Bastani, A., ‘Fully Automated Luxury Communism’, Weekly Economics Podcast [podcast], P2P Foundation, 2016, https://blog.p2pfoundation.net/fully-automated-luxury-communism/2016/06/14, (accessed 10/04/2017). 105 Ibid.

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power. Those in power would have no incentive to provide such near-absolute concessions. Thus, a violent

revolt seems the only viable way to secure maximal liberty under FALC.

Consequently, we must conceive of how such violence can be justified. One answer lies in our

definition of violence. Marxist theorist Slavoj Žižek, in his book Violence, argues that violence cannot

simply be understood as the “perturbation of the ‘normal,’ peaceful state of things.”106 Rather, he

suggests that much violence is “precisely the violence inherent to this ‘normal’ state of things.”107 He

names this sort of violence ‘objective violence’, and suggests that the inequalities and abuses innate to

social systems such as capitalism, as well as the ‘symbolic’ oppression of sexism and racism etc., constitute

forms of violence which are vitally damaging, and yet are largely ignored.108 They are part of the expected

norm, and are thus dismissed as natural, unavoidable, non-violent.

If we take this account of violence and apply it to our issue of transition, the discussion becomes

significantly more nuanced. Žižek’s definition of violence seems reasonable; it takes a broad view of

violence as oppression generally, rather than mere physical, bodily damage. Through this lens, automated

capitalism seems highly violent; it is perpetuated on the oppression of the non-owners by the owners.

The UBI seems to alleviate some of this violence. Yet it remains predicated on an oppressive, competitive

social arrangement, and thus fails to alleviate all violence. Essentially, in the same way the UBI does not

promote liberty maximally, it also fails to prevent violence maximally. In contrast, FALC serves to

maximally prevent this broadly defined version of violence, simply by eliminating hierarchical oppression

and systemic violence through its implementation of a maximally free and equal society.

Thus, it seems reasonable to accept a limited amount of violence in the form of a revolution,

providing the revolution’s goal is to alleviate systemic violence by establishing FALC. There is always a risk

106 Slavoj Žižek, Violence, New York, US, Picador, 2008, p. 2. 107 Ibid., (my itals.). 108 Ibid., pp. 12-13.

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in revolution that it will fail, and its use of violence will be gratuitous and ineffectual. Yet the alternative

is the perpetuation of a system based upon endless systemic oppression and violence. Revolutionaries

must, of course, take heed from previous thinkers’ recommendations for revolutions, such as Rosa

Luxemburg’s dialectic of spontaneity and organisation, or Hannah Arendt’s appeal to adapt as the

revolution and its spirit progresses.109 110 This will help reduce the violence caused, as well as improve the

chances of the revolution being successful. Ultimately, however, violent revolutionary action is necessary

to alleviate the systemic violence intrinsic within automated capitalism. Thus, despite its apparent denial

of liberty in the short-term, revolutionary violence is a vital catalyst to achieve true maximal freedom.

Nozick, Cohen, and Distributive Justice

However, apart from violence, there is another issue which needs to be addressed when conceiving

of a transition to FALC. This is the question of whether transition itself even upholds the values of a liberty-

focussed FALC. Isn’t the forced appropriation of the means of production a violation of the owners’ rights?

Robert Nozick’s book Anarchy, State and Utopia, originally a response to Rawls, explores this very issue.

Nozick argues that the current owners of property are in their position as a consequence of an historical

process of numerous exchanges between consenting parties.111 These exchanges were deemed just, and

the parties involved were not coerced. As a result, Nozick argues, any confiscation of an owner’s property

would constitute a violation of their rights.112 This, applied to our automated economy scenario, suggests

that the owners of the means of production are rightful owners, and to deprive them of their property

would amount to theft, regardless of how much liberty it might produce. Furthermore, Nozick argues that

any kind of patterned redistributive effort, such as Rawls’s, is flawed by its inability to accommodate

109 Luxemburg, R., ‘Organisational Questions of Russian Social Democracy’ (1904), in Le Blanc, P. and Scott, H. C. (eds.), Rosa Luxemburg, Socialism or Barbarism: Selected Writings, London, UK, Pluto Press, 2010, pp. 92, 98. 110 Arendt, H., Arendt, H., On Revolution (1963), New York, US, Penguin Books, 2006, pp. 245-6. 111 Nozick, R., Anarchy, State and Utopia (1974), Oxford, UK, Blackwell, 1999, pp. 161-62. 112 Ibid., pp. 163-64.

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consensual exchange between individuals. If exchange is allowed, the result would be a slow transition

back into an inegalitarian society.113 On the other hand, banning these consensual exchanges would

represent a severe breach of individuals’ liberty of action. Thus, either way, redistributive efforts always

produce unfreedom.

This criticism is compelling. However, there is a response to it. Cohen notes that Nozick accepts that

exchanges which are “always irrational or arbitrary”114 cannot be considered reasonable examples of

consensual exchange, and that transfers must be mostly “done for reasons.”115 Cohen argues that this,

essentially, means that adequate knowledge of the conditions of the exchange must be held by both

parties; otherwise the exchange is troubling. Cohen extends this argument to contend that exchanges are

possible (and indeed probable) in which one or both parties do not know the extent or nature of a

transaction’s consequence. For instance, if that transaction contributed to the generation of an

unforeseeable, yet vastly unequal future society, Cohen questions whether either party would “have

agreed to it had he known what its outcome would be?”116 Thus, he posits, transactional justice based

purely on momentary consent is an inadequate method of ensuring a truly just society.117 Furthermore,

Cohen argues that Nozick’s transactional justice, despite proclaiming the value of consent, in fact fails to

account for the consent of posterity. Unborn generations cannot possibly be asked whether they agree to

the economic situation which they will be born into, and which will “have the effect of seriously modifying,

for the worse, their situation.”118 As a result, although transactional justice seems to uphold the liberty of

individuals, it in fact ignores the ‘consent’ of many affected individuals.

113 Nozick, R., Anarchy, State and Utopia, 1974, pp. 163-164. 114 Ibid., p. 159. 115 Ibid. 116 Cohen, G. A., Self-Ownership, Freedom and Equality, Cambridge, UK, Cambridge University Press, 1995, p. 23. 117 Ibid. 118 Ibid., p. 22.

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Additionally, whilst the choice of those parties involved may be granted, this is amounts - often

unbeknownst to them – to choosing a choice-less future. This is because, if money is indeed a ‘freedom

ticket’, then a radically unequal society would deprive many of the freedom to engage in the sort of life

they desire. This results in a form of ‘self-chosen’ enslavement, which most would consider invalid119 as a

choice, particularly as it is unlikely one would know they were enslaving themselves and others. Thus,

patterned justice, despite its rejection of consensual exchange, preserves and enhances liberty overall by

maximising the choice of all people (by maintaining an egalitarian society).

Applying this thinking to our scenario of an automated society, FALC’s enforcement of a patterned

form of justice – in which the means of production are appropriated from their owners – seems justifiable.

It is true that the consent of the owners will be violated, yet the alternative to this is the continuation and

further development of a vastly unequal (and unfree) society. Indeed, this type of society, by virtue of

being so unequal, will deny choice to the masses. Furthermore, one could argue that the very institutions

of property and capitalism are inherently unfree, and that in reality – despite their superficial support for

‘choice’ and consent – they construct barriers to true choice. Consequently, the systems by which the

owners have profited are innately anti-choice, and indeed the owners have likely done nothing to

‘deserve’ the rights to property that they nominally hold120. Thus, the dismantling of these systems

represents not an intrusion on consent, but rather an establishment of a system which allows for true,

universalised consent. Consequently, Nozick’s appeal to historical events falls down, precisely because

said historical events predicated themselves on a system based on the denial of choice and liberty.

Ultimately, then, it is clear that FALC is superior – to a non-distributive system and a property-based

119 Although Nozick, interestingly, does consider self-enslavement valid (p. 331 ASU). This perhaps sheds light on his acceptance of transactional justice which allows for a party to agree to a seemingly ‘bad’ deal; although this still does not give said party the right to consign others to enslavement. 120 Unless they were born before the economy was fully automated and thus worked for their ownership. Even accepting this, it is dubious whether they truly ‘deserve’ their ownership if they inherited it or were born into a rich family, etc.

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distributive system such as the UBI – in its ability to secure maximal freedom in an automated society,

despite its apparent denial of certain rights and precedents of exchange.

Conclusion

Ultimately, this chapter has demonstrated that FALC is a superior method of achieving maximal

freedom in an automated society compared with the UBI. It began by showing how exactly it achieves

this; specifically, through the dispersal of wealth and the establishing of community. Next, it briefly

demonstrated how FALC overcomes the problems faced by the UBI. It then argued that, despite some

denial of short-term liberty, revolutionary violence to establish FALC is necessary to prevent violence and

to promote liberty overall. Finally, it explored the debate between Nozick and Cohen about whether

distributive justice violates the freedom of exchange between individuals, concluding that it does not.

Clearly then, FALC is the best way to ensure liberty is produced fairly and efficiently. In an automated

society, inequality – as shown in chapter two – necessarily leads to hierarchy and dependence, both of

which significantly inhibit liberty. FALC, by guaranteeing equality, avoids these hierarchical issues, and

instead promotes cooperation and the fair distribution of resources, which in turn lead to a maximally

free society. Thus, in an automated economy, the only choice facing a society which desires maximal

liberty is to establish (probably through revolution) luxury communism.

46

Conclusion

This dissertation has sought, throughout its chapters, to identify the problem automation poses to

liberty in society, and find adequate solutions. This is clearly an important, and somewhat urgent, task to

undertake. It is vital that political thought and research is dedicated not merely to immanent or present

concerns, but also to issues such as automation – or climate change, to name another – which present

either considerable threats, or considerable opportunities, for our current social, political, and economic

situation, depending upon how we address them. Automation will, undoubtedly, have tremendous effects

on human society – now is the time to think about, and thus shape, what those effects might be. This

dissertation aims to be a small part of that early, essential thought.

The first chapter set out to articulate the initial threat which automation poses to liberty in a society.

It began with an exploration of what a just society might look like. Accepting liberty as a reasonable ideal,

it consulted various thinkers’ definitions of liberty, before settling on a Rawlsian definition of a just society

as one which maximises liberty – defined as individuals’ freedom of choice – across society whilst also

maximising the liberty of the least-free individual. The chapter then continued with an analysis of the

current threats which automation poses to liberty. It suggested stagnant wages and unemployment are

caused, in a significant part, by automation, and that people’s economic security will continue to be

threatened as automation proliferates. The chapter concluded with a warning about the future effects of

automation on liberty, which could potentially be catastrophic, and then introduced the two solutions to

this issue which are discussed in the next two chapters: the UBI, and FALC.

The second chapter explored the first of two solutions to the problem of automation – the UBI. It

began with an outline of the UBI, including a discussion of its key features and goals, and of the arguments

of its main proponents. Next it highlighted some common critiques often levelled at the UBI, and showed

47

how they are not enough, particularly in an automated economic setting, to discredit its ability to

maximise liberty. However, the chapter then continued with an exploration of various more in-depth

critiques of the UBI’s capacity to promote liberty, including: the UBI’s incentivisation of the non-

maximisation of liberty; its entrenching of dependence; its lack of focus on unfreedom generated in

production; and its reliance on a necessarily hierarchical redistributive economy. All of these critiques, the

chapter concluded, are significant enough to derail the UBI’s potential for establishing maximal liberty in

a society, and indeed show, in some cases, how the UBI entrenches oppression rather than liberty. Thus,

an alternative solution is needed. Such a solution was explored in chapter three: FALC.

The third chapter presented a more radical, and yet more compelling, solution to the problem of

automation and liberty. It began with a description of FALC and its differences with the UBI which allow it

to achieve maximal liberty. Next, the chapter demonstrated how FALC is unaffected by the problems,

detailed in the previous chapter, which undermine the UBI. The chapter then discussed two potential

issues: of violence discrediting FALC’s goal of liberty; and the charge that all distributive measures violate

an individual’s right to free exchange. The chapter concluded that these problems, although notable, are

ultimately not enough to weaken FALC’s ability to provide maximal freedom in society, and that FALC is

thus the best solution to the problem of automation and liberty.

This dissertation has attempted to answer the question of how to combat the loss of liberty inevitably

resulting from an unmodified society which has undergone automation. There are, of course, many

questions which arise out of this study which are areas for further research. How would developing

countries be differently affected by automation, and how might this affect their response? How would

political decision-making be affected by automation; would it too be automated, and if so, does this

constitute a loss of (Arendt-esque) political liberty? What if the owners of the means of production

develop automated military capabilities to fend off revolution, and thus perpetuate the oppression of the

non-owners? Or indeed, what if they see no further value in the non-owners and decide to exterminate

48

them? Clearly these are important questions which must be explored in much greater depth than there is

space to do so in this dissertation.

Nevertheless, this dissertation aims to make an important contribution to the central question of

how automation might affect liberty, and what should be done about it. It is apparent now that Fukuyama

was wrong – liberalism does not represent the end of history. It cannot continue, little-changed,

indefinitely. Instead, its reliance on market capitalism means it is at the mercy of automation and the

serious threats to liberty which accompany it. It is thus imperative to find a solution, and quickly, to this

problem. This dissertation, for its part, contends that such a solution can be found in fully automated

luxury communism; a radical solution, but one which nevertheless allows for the maximisation of liberty

for individuals in society.

49

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