Behavioral engineered self-control masks society’s ultimate control over individuals
Evidence
In the community of Walden Two, reinforcement is precisely orchestrated to eliminate emotions that threaten cooperation. Only “productive and strengthening emotions—joy and love” are allowed. Feelings of sorrow and hate “and the high-voltage excitements of anger, fear, and rage” are considered “wasteful and dangerous” threats to “the needs of modern life.” Any form of distinction between persons undermines the harmony of the whole and its capacity to bend to collective purpose. Frazier acknowledges that you cannot coerce people into doing the right thing. The solution is far more subtle and sophisticated, based upon scientifically calibrated schedules of reinforcement: “Instead you have to set up certain behavioral processes which will lead the individual to design his own ‘good’ conduct.… We call that sort of thing ‘self-control.’ But don’t be misled, the control always rests in the last analysis in the hands of society.” — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1386
Categorization
- DEFINE: Defines the surveillance-capitalism ideal: engineered ‘self-control’ where the individual freely designs good conduct but final control stays with owners.
- XREF: Connects to Zamyatin’s We and its engineered happiness, plus the broader tradition of utopian social engineering. — connects to: Behavioral control technology reached civilian society under cover of cold-war and crime panics — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1016; Behaviorism says self-control is just manipulating variables that determine behavior — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1163; Self-control is maintained socially, through others, not only individually — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement: How People Do Harm…, 331 (+15 more)
Broader Connections
- Operational concepts terminate in improved methods of social control
#corroborates(0.80) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 431 - Self-control is maintained socially, through others, not only individually
#qualifies(0.78) — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 331 - Fairness impulses must compete against natural selfish impulses via self-regulation
#complicates(0.78) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 242 - Behavior is regulated by legal, social, and self-evaluative sanctions
#expands(0.75) - Social control includes winning consent, not just coercive punishment
#contradicts(0.75) - Liberation-from-control paradoxically requires self-control by a prior autonomous self
#expands(0.72) - Societies can be controlled through engineered pleasure rather than coercion
#exemplifies(0.72) — , The Braided Reading EPUB, 1253 - Technical rationality makes irrational social control appear reasonable and rational
#corroborates(0.72) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 124 - Class struggle offers a viewpoint immune to systemic self-regulation’s allure
#responds-to(0.70) — Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition, 153