Technocracy refers to any political–social–economic system that is governed and managed using purportedly objective scientific and technical principles, and in which ultimate power and authority rests with technical and scientific experts. The concept had its initial origins in the early decades of the Industrial Revolution (with antecedents stretching back to the rationalism of ancient Greece and, later, the Enlightenment in the West). Henri Saint-Simon in early 19th century France was the earliest exponent of a technocratic system which involved overall political and economic government by industrialists. Technocracy was formally coined as a term in the early 20th century in the United States in the context of a specific intellectual movement under the same name which laid out a more detailed system of economic and social management by industrialists and scientists that supposedly would guarantee maximum efficiency in production, consumption and distribution without the self-defeating tendencies of political systems of the time, either democratic or authoritarian. Technocracy is currently used to refer to any policy or governmental arrangement that purportedly emphasizes technical criteria above non-technical values in policy, planning and public decision-making, and which gives significant authority to experts. Singapore is often referred to as a leading example of such an approach. Various controversies have arisen around technocracy, especially its potential incompatibility with democracy and social values that are not easily translated into technical terms. There is also debate about how feasible a genuine technocracy actually is in practice.
In a very general sense, technocracy refers to any political–social–economic system that is governed and managed through the use of purportedly objective scientific and technical principles, and in which the real power and authority rests with technical and scientific experts. The most common, and more narrow, formulation of the term denotes a form of political organisation in which politics, in the sense of contests between interests and values, has been transcended by the dynamics and achievements of technological advance and where scientific and technical experts make and implement major policy decisions
[1] (pp. 49–50).
The actual term “technocracy” is said to have been coined in 1919 by a California engineer, William Henry Smyth, to mean “rule by technicians”, and became the label for an American advocacy movement in the 1920s and 1930s that argued for the necessity for such rule because, supposedly, the technical complexity of modern industrial economies could not be left in the hands of non-specialists
[2]. Technocracy as a movement was most influential during the Great Depression as a way of explaining that slump as a symptom of inefficient political and economic management.
Technocracy remains in usage, but the meaning has narrowed somewhat to denote governmental administration by experts along purportedly neutral technical lines, either fully or in only specific areas. Singapore is the archetypal example of the former, while central bank management is an example of the latter.
There are a number of important issues and debates around technocracy, both conceptually and practically. Philosophically, technocracy rests on the assumption that important aspects of reality can be reduced to material, mechanistic terms subject to effective and predictable human technical understanding and intervention. Broader social values often sit outside such a model, and its applicability to even many technical spheres can be complex. Politically, technocracy is arguably incompatible with democracy and other forms of government based on the popular will or at least sits uneasily within such frameworks. Reconciling the two is not straightforward. Practically, technocrat elements may be useful, and sometimes even necessary, in the design, planning and oversight of human systems. But how this can be done effectively is an ongoing matter of debate, especially in policy circles. A critical figure in technocracy is the technocrat, and the proper delineation and character of this figure is also contested. This entry reviews all of these issues in more detail, starting with the historical antecedents and origins of the term and moving through its various incarnations and the issues that have arisen from its use and implementation. The primary focus is on presentation and analysis of core conceptual and theoretical definitions and contours, and the issues that arise when theory is put into actual practice.
This entry is adapted from the peer-reviewed paper 10.3390/encyclopedia5040194
