This piece was written by Deiniol Brown: Founder of The UK Forum on a Multipolar World and a Master’s student in Politics and International Relations at Peking University 

The Rise of Technoliberalism

Over the last few decades, the international expansion of free markets and the rise of new communications technologies have rapidly reordered economies and communities on a global scale. These systems have contributed to a more atomised society, with individuals becoming less engaged in their local communities, instead being connected to a decentralised global network run by largely unaccountable platforms which are motivated by commercial aims. These developments have been underpinned by the predominance of liberal concepts like individual liberty and free trade, coalescing under what is now called “technoliberalism”. But this ‘technoliberal’ shift, ostensibly predicated on liberal values, has come into contradiction with many social liberal systems of representation, accountability and social cohesion. In the face of this conflict, could the age-old concept of solidarity provide a reformulation of liberalism to fit the modern world?          

The UK has been deeply impacted by the rise of technoliberalism, which now challenges many of our institutions and the social liberal principles they were built on. Although the UK didn’t necessarily intend to go down this path, with institutions like the BBC still receiving strong public support, global changes have ultimately shifted the political, economic and social landscape of the country. The impact has been profound: the disintegration of parts of civil society, the creation of a powerful but unaccountable tech-bro elite and the propagation of dangerous ideologies. As debates about the corrosiveness of technoliberalism intensify amongst moderate voices, [including the SLF's own recent event with DSIT Spokesperson, Victoria Collins MP] the question is, how do we address it?     

The UK's Response

To respond to the atomising effect of technoliberalism that emphasises the individual’s relationship with the external world, the age-old idea of solidarity could be a powerful tool, shifting onto horizontal people-to-people relations. Solidarity is by no means a new concept, having been part of social liberal discourse for centuries and continuing to play a part in our political space often through organisations like charities and social enterprises. However, solidarity is rarely seen as a potential ordering principle of a state and is easily relegated as a nebulous and idealistic notion. But this is not inevitable, and in her recent book ‘States of Solidarity’, academic Barbara Prainsack seeks to rectify this by proposing solidarity as a practice that can be instated in government institutions. Applying the conceptual shift proposed by Prainsack whereby the state governs through collective as well as individual interests, the destructive tendencies of technoliberalism can be combatted, and liberalism can be reworked in a more socially conscious way.

Solidarity is particularly important for the UK in the current period of discontent and global instability. The retreat from civil society has reduced social cohesion and political pluralism, whilst social media algorithms encourage outrage and conflict over mutual understanding. This has eroded trust in established systems and driven a populist politics that threatens many tenets of a liberal society. At the same time, the dominance of billionaire-owned unaccountable American tech companies over the means of social organisation, and the encroaching commercialisation of previously collective spaces, has put the British state at a disadvantage in weathering the storm of uncertainty around the world.   

Building a Better Britain

By reframing how we understand the liberal principles that the UK is built on by instituting solidarity, we can build a system that addresses these issues. Through solidarist governance of sectors like social media, which would focus less on an individual’s right to own means of communication and instead promote society’s right to collectively decide the rules of a community, we can create a system that champions shared interests over exploitation. There are some scholars already working on this, namely the University of Vienna’s Centre for Contemporary Solidarity, where Prainsack is the director, which researches how solidarity can be practically incorporated into policy. They look at issues like data governance, where current practices across Europe employ an individualist lens which inhibits the enforcement of community-wide interests in regulation and in turn has led to widespread abuse of data privacy. Institutionalising solidarity in data governance instead puts the responsibility of applying collective interests on the government, a democratically representative body, rather than private companies which profit from manipulation. The lessons from this example can be applied more widely; solidarity addresses the fact that individual liberties sometimes endanger other aspects of a free society. 

It is clear to see how a solidarist approach could be beneficial in the UK, protecting citizens’ liberty while tempering the extremities of political and social decentralisation that technoliberalism brings. So many of our pressing issues derive from this alienation between the forces that impact society and people’s power to collectively shape them, seen in issues like the housing crisis and the rise of the ‘take back control’ agenda. This alienation was caused by a liberal system that distanced the individual from their community and captured them in a digital reality. And now more than ever we need a shift in thinking to address this whilst protecting the fundamental ideals of liberty and democracy. A UK that embraces solidarity can make that shift, so we can find the impetus and the direction we desperately need to regain confidence in our society, and protect our values on the international stage.