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I think, in theory, a society with much less privacy could work, as long as there is information symmetry, not a panopticon controlled by a few. We're not building an open society, though. The asymmetry is the point. If we ignore the open society angle and assume surveillance would be one sided: Competition is needed for healthy capitalist economies. Competition doesn't work well with great power imbalances. To the extent entrenched business could leverage the government, as they do, powers of surveillance could be used to stifle competition. That leads to stagnation. Democracy, even in a limited form, doesn't work when everyone is under surveillance by a powerful minority. I don't think I need to elaborate since there's been plenty of writing on that. Also, people don't want to make civic contributions to a society that treats them like cows with a criminal bent. There's not much argument against being a hedonic leech in a society that benefits from your labor but resents your autonomy. I haven't answered your question exactly, but it's a bit difficult when framed that way. I still think it's pretty clear that the massive power imbalance that comes with dragnet surveillance can catalyze corruption, stagnation, and malaise, thus impeding progress. |
I suspect what many forget or were perhaps unaware of is the in practice society with near zero privacy existed for the vast bulk of actual human history.
Before the car and the radical change in individual human movement that came about for those parts of the world privileged enough to have a car for every family the majority of people lived within a small radius surrounded by people who effectivel knew every detail of each others lives .. if not as it happened then almost certainly by the next quarter as word spread.
Again, as I mentioned above, I like privacy .. but it remains true that the greatest expansions of modern western economies; mass production, feeding quantitively more with less land and labour, etc .. all happened without any essential dependance upon privacy to bring these changes about.
It is the upstream grandparent claim that privacy is fundemental and essential for any advancement in a society that doesn't pass the smell test and certainly hasn't yet been well argued for.
I absolutely do agree that it is desirable .. but essential (in a strict sense) for the continuation of human society .. that needs better argument to pass muster.