Modernity’s disaster is not backwardness but the domination machinery itself.

Evidence

In Marcuse’s view, the powers of reason and freedom are declining in “late industrial society”: “With the increasing concentration and effectiveness of economic, political, and cultural controls, the opposition in all these fields has been pacified, co-ordinated, or liquidated.” Indeed, reason has become an instrument of domination: “It helps to organize, administer, and anticipate the powers that be, and to liquidate the ‘power of Negativity.’ Reason has identified itself with the reality: what is actual is reasonable, although what is reasonable has not yet become actuality. — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 34 (#expands, via linked claim)

In respect of administrative resources, tendencies towards increasing democratic involvement have as their dark side possibilities for the creation of totalitarian power. The intensifying of surveillance operations provides many avenues of democratic involvement, but also makes possible the sectional control of political power, bolstered by monopolistic access to the means of violence, as an instrument of terror. Totalitarianism and modernity are not just contingently, but inherently, connected, as Zygmunt Bauman in particular has made clear. — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 401 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Domination is perpetuated by thought’s own ossification, not by technology; Modernity is a deliberate power project, not a natural unfolding — Sherene Razack, Casting Out: The Eviction of Muslims…, 375; Modernity is trouble and a problem, not simply progress — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2: Identity…, 185 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Reason itself becomes an instrument of domination in late industrial society #expands (0.85) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 34
• Domination is perpetuated by thought’s own ossification, not by technology #complicates (0.82)
• Totalitarianism is inherently, not just contingently, connected to modernity #expands (0.80) — Anthony Giddens, The Consequences of Modernity, 401
• Modernity is trouble and a problem, not simply progress #expands (0.78) — Stuart Hall, Essential Essays, Volume 2, 185
• Modernity is a deliberate power project, not a natural unfolding #expands (0.75) — Sherene Razack, Casting Out, 375