Jeffrey Friedman

Technocrats claim to know how to solve the social and economic problems of complex modern societies. But as Jeffrey Friedman argues in Power without Knowledge, there is a fundamental flaw with technocracy: it requires an ability to predict how the people whom technocrats attempt to control will act in response to technocratic policies. However, the mass public's ideas-the ideas that drive their actions-are far too varied and diverse to be reliably predicted. But that is not the only problem. Friedman reminds us that a large part of contemporary mass politics, even populist mass politics, is essentially technocratic too. Members of the general public often assume that they are competent to decide which policies or politicians will be able to solve social and economic problems. Yet these ordinary "citizen-technocrats" typically regard the solutions to social problems as self-evident, such that politics becomes a matter of vetting public officials for their good intentions and strong wills, not their technocratic expertise. Finally, Friedman argues that technocratic experts themselves drastically oversimplify technocratic realities. Economists, for example, theorize that people respond rationally to the incentives they face. This theory is simplistic, but it gives the appearance of being able to predict people's behavior in response to technocratic policy initiatives. If stripped of such gross oversimplications, though, technocrats themselves would be forced to admit that a rational technocracy is nothing more than an impossible dream. Ranging widely over the philosophy of social science, rational choice theory, and empirical political science, Power without Knowledge is a pathbreaking work that upends traditional assumptions about technocracy and politics, forcing us to rethink our assumptions about the legitimacy of modern governance.

A Critique of Technocracy

Power Without Knowledge

In The Longing for Total Revolution: Philosophic Sources of Discontent from Rousseau to Marx and Nietzsche (1986), the eminent intellectual historian and political theorist Bernard Yack offered a sweeping reinterpretation of modern thought. Yack argued that Rousseau prompted a line of philosophy that continued through Kant, Hegel, Marx and Nietzsche, which viewed the essential spirit of modernity as dehumanizing, and therefore implied, in a matter that became increasingly clear over time, that a total revolution against modernity is necessary. In this volume, seven political theorists and historians, including Yack himself, reconsider the book’s substantive and methodological innovations, its limitations, and its current relevance. Contributors to the volume discuss, inter alia, left Kantianism in historical context, the theological origins of the longing for total revolution, the question of whether the tradition identified by Yack is connected to twentieth-century totalitarianism, and the unique form of critical genealogy pioneered by Yack’s book. The volume concludes with Yack’s response to the other contributors’ chapters. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Critical Review.

Rousseau, Marx, Nietzsche, and Modernity

The Longing for Total Revolution Reconsidered

In the Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion (1992), John Zaller set out one of the most influential models of opinion formation: he presented the public as a pliable instrument of political elites, who are able to garner support simply by sending "cues" through the mass media telling Republicans or Democrats, for example, what "the" Republican or Democratic position is on a given issue. Contributors to this volume critically examine Zaller’s model and its implications, empirical and normative. The introduction contrasts two different strands in Zaller’s book, one of which confines the impact of media messages to politicians’ cues, the other of which emphasizes the impact of journalists’ interpretive frames. Other chapters examine whether elite domination of public opinion is desirable and assess how well Zaller’s model has withstood two decades of research. Zaller himself contributes a long retrospective in which he modifies some claims, defends others, and sets out a bold new research agenda. This book was published as a special issue of Critical Review: A Journal of Politics and Society.

What Determines Public Opinion?

The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion Reconsidered

Sharon Wood

Robert P. Epstein

The past few years have featured such blockbusters as "Super-Size Me," "Fahrenheit 9/11," "Sicko," "March of the Penguins," and "An Inconvenient Truth." And as news articles proclaim a new era in the history of documentary films, more and more new directors are making their first film a nonfiction one. But in addition to posing all of the usual challenges inherent to more standard filmmaking, documentaries also present unique problems that need to be understood from the outset. Where does the idea come from? How do you raise the money? How "much" money do you need? What visual style is best suited to the story? What are the legal issues involved? And how can a film reach that all-important milestone and find a willing distributor? Epstein, Friedman, and Wood tackle all of these important questions with examples and anecdotes from their own careers. The result is an informative and entertaining guide for those just starting out, and an enlightening read for anyone interested in a behind-the-scenes look at this newly reinvigorated field of film.

Jeffrey Friedman

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