Theory work: project Autonomy

[Michael Allan]

I'm thinking of splitting the work of Votorola into 3 separate
projects:

     --------------------------------------------------------------
      Project    Purpose        Site
     ---------  -------------  ------------------------------------
      Votorola   code           http://zelea.com/project/votorola/

      coco-d     architecture   none yet, probably somewhere in the
                                pollwiki: http://u.zelea.com/w

      Autonomy   theory         http://zelea.com/project/autonomy/
     --------------------------------------------------------------

Currently the technical work (code and architecture) is the most
advanced while the theory is lagging.  A bottom-up approach to the
theory might begin with the fact of the architecture and progress
through the possibilites of deploying it in society.  It would
therefore ask questions like:

    * What is the purpose of the architecture?
    * How does it fit in society?
    * How do the details of design contribute to the purpose/fit?

These questions are mostly already answered, in fact, by previous
work.  The original texts need only be expanded and redacted for
publication.  I plan to publish a series of papers (*) under two
categories of research:

   I. A TECHNOLOGY OF LARGE-SCALE COMMUNICATIVE ACTION

    * Voting media in the service of large-scale
      communicative action

    * Drafting media in the service of large-scale
      communicative action

    * Discussion media in the service of large-scale
      communicative action

  II. THE INSTITUTION OF COMMUNICATIVE ACTION IN POLITICS

    * The structuring of power by communicative action

    * Rule making by communicative action

These will cover the "fit in society" and short-term political
purposes.  But those are only prerequisites, in turn, for a larger
purpose that's more difficult to characterize.  The theory must
therefore go a step further in addressing the possiblities of
"whatever might come next."  This opens a third category which I
assume is largely unexplored:

 III. THE MEANING OF MODERN CONSENSUS

    * The essential plurality in the modern construction of consensus

    * A ratchet to modernity's end: freely stepped consensus
      and the realization of autonomy

    * Consensual utopia as a societal religion

    * Soteriology of distant worlds: salvation in the speed of light

The whole program could be called "Project Autonomy" (after Kant and
Hegel) and subtitled "speculations on a methodology of societal
restructuring by communicative action."  I plan to preface it with an
essay that ties together and summarizes the work in all three
categories:

    * Prolegomenon: the inevitable expectation of a utopian consensus

(All easier said than done, of course.)  Anyway, I'm currently into
the initial research for category III.  If you know of any similar
work, please share sources.  My own bibliography is posted at:
http://zelea.com/project/autonomy/bibliography.xht

-- 
Michael Allan

Toronto, +1 647-436-4521
http://zelea.com/