The technocentric differs
from the ecocentric in how he would approach
environmental issues, and in his basic ideologies. He is identified by an apparent
undiluted rational, scientific approach, which particularly translates itself into an
economic rationality founded on the neo-classical school, There is, too, a belief in the
ability and efficiency of management in solving problems by the use of 'objective
analysis' and recourse to the laws of physical science - the natural authority of which
is extended to economic 'laws'.
This management includes
management of the environment - and of men, for unlike
the ecocentric the technocentric turns away from public participation in
environmental and other decision-making in favour of accepting as authoritative the
advice of (scientific and economic) 'experts'. Although this is ostensibly a rational
mode, such rationalism may be stripped away to expose a raw and sometimes
irrational faith - a faith in the idea of progress as expressed in, and equivalent to,
material advancement, in the superiority of 'high' over 'lower' technology, in the
sustainability of economic growth, and in the ability of advanced capitalism to
maintain itself.
Frequently those who
express such faiths have much to gain materially by their
application. And their resultant undetached and unobjective position manifests itself
in an irrationality which clearly transgresses the technocentric's own terms. Thus a
truly 'objective' and 'expert' cost-benefit analysis would probably have grounded the
Concorde project before it ever left the drawing board. It would probably have
stopped the nuclear power plant building programme of the British Conservative
Government which came to office in 1979, for many economic forcasts of demand
for fast travel and for energy showed that both programmes would be redundant in
the face of Britain's declining future needs.
However, if irrationality
lies behind the rational facade, so too, according to does a
lack of confidence lie beneath the authoritative expert aura. For if one 'strips off the
veil of optimism' one can reveal underneath an inherent and disquieting uncertainty,
prevarication, and tendency to error. Thus, the management of British Nuclear Fuels
Ltd. argued vehemently at the 1978 Windscale Inquiry into the reprocessing of
atomic waste, that adequate and stringent safety precautions were taken at the
Cumbrian atomic plant where the reprocessing was intended. Yet, two years later, a
report was finding evidence of managerial incompetence over radioactive waste
which had leaked some years earlier into the soil surrounding the plant, while in 1983
Government legal action was contemplated against the management because of
new leaks. And the story of the accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant
in Pennsylvania in 1979 is studded with examples of the technocrats' prevarication
and error to a remarkable degree. Many follow ups after failures of management do
not assure us that lessons will be learned and that they could never happen again.
