Silicon States

by Lucie Greene

  If Zuckerberg or one of his peers were to run and be elected, there could be big changes ahead. Some would say Facebook and Amazon are near nation-states already (almost a third of the world’s population is on Facebook, after all), but their platforms and services are still participatory, limited to certain behaviors such as socializing and shopping, and malleable around each of our own universes. They are, to an extent, monitored by at least a veneer of consumer power. Meanwhile, the biases and skewed beliefs of their founders are confined to their philanthropic and investment ventures. Elon Musk’s belief that universal basic income might solve the unemployment crisis looming at the hands of automation is a soapbox talking point, not a policy. A new tech-driven, hyper-personalized approach to education is seen as a way to fix the broken schools, create equal opportunity for lower-income citizens, and future-proof society. It ignores education’s intangible variances affected by socioeconomic structure, systemic multi-generational unemployment, and cultural disenfranchisement—but is, for now, limited to new test private schools supported by tech billionaires. Silicon Valley–backed scientific prize funds dramatically and disproportionately support white men; that does not stop women scientists, and is not their only source of funding. Until it is.

  When these are writ large on society, and start to replace the state, their distorting power will be magnified. More than social networks, products, or internet supermarkets we can step in and out of, we’ll be forced to actually live inside these constructs.

  Everything starts innocently, and positively. Why wouldn’t you want data to be freely shared? Why wouldn’t you want seamless service? Many government systems would be made more efficient, automated, and digitized in a Silicon Valley regime. Although, that could easily extend to TaskRabbit-style platforms replacing emergency services, or on-demand fire services powered by contractors, or social media regulating services such as water and roads. (What happens when there’s surge pricing, not enough Uber firefighters, or no background checks?) When working at Facebook itself, work, life, and socializing are already blurred into one. In a not-too-distant world, the lines between citizenship, employment, and a consumerism could similarly blur in a continuous ecosystem that combines consumer voting, personal government documents all stored on Facebook, and people’s résumés up for public scrutiny.

  As companies such as Amazon move into financial services and identity verification, higher-income consumers could be treated more favorably. As Amazon becomes a social network with devices like Echo Look, financial clout and social influence could be combined and assessed to inform election campaigning or policies. Sustainability and LGBT rights seem high on Facebook’s public agenda, as well as a broadly neoliberal belief system—again all part of Facebook being a major consumer brand, but that could create its own alienating dictum. Could Millennial Neoliberalism replace the far-right leadership we have in the U.S. now? And be as divisive? Trump may be alienating to coastal liberals, but the belief systems of privileged, Ivy League–educated men living and working in rarified confines of Northern California do not represent everyone either. After all, progressivism itself is a somewhat elite concept. Or maybe government becomes the ultimate, algorithmically driven, constantly updating consumer brand, affected by reading consumer sentiment continuously. Blockchain (the decentralized, instantly updating database technology) could power our voting on a multitude of issues instantaneously. Or we could simply vote like we’re taking a BuzzFeed survey.

  Robert Moses, the legendary mid-twentieth-century urban developer, is in many ways a prophetic warning of the consequences of Silicon Valley’s civic influence. Moses imposed his vision on postwar America, stripping cities of undesirable neighborhoods, building new modern developments, parks, and swimming pools—and making way for the automobile, which he saw as central to America’s economic future. He cut superhighways over and through existing historic cities. He built new housing projects, social experiments to accommodate the poor, under the banner of “urban renewal,” many of which alienated and damaged those same communities. He was immune to the existing and largely successful complex ecosystems housed within cities, which were observed, championed, and highlighted in Jane Jacobs’s famous 1961 book The Death and Life of Great American Cities. Silicon Valley is selling us an updated, data-driven, tech-obsessed future with similar vision, prejudices, and blind spots. And it’s getting increasingly close to realizing similar ambitions. Do we really want a sky full of drones delivering everything for us? Should public transport be on-demand? Is the driverless car really the future? Efficiencies, increased sustainability, and technological advances are great, but as more of the city becomes connected, more of our interactions are commercialized, too.

  After all, Amazon Echo and Google Home hubs are given away at knock-down $30 prices, because the gadgets aren’t the product, we are. Our interactions, behaviors, and purchases generate valuable data for targeted offers and advertising. When the city becomes connected, all urban life is another product.

  Silicon Valley is now better positioned than most industries to wield political influence. And in ways we have not seen before. It is at once government vendor, collaborator, sponsor, advisor, communicator, rival, and enemy on any given day. Its platforms are now integral to democracy, elections, and governments. Its companies and venture-capital funds have had access to more money than ever before. Apple’s cash reserves in 2017 were more than $250 billion; total Federal Reserves in November 2016 were just over $118 billion. The Valley’s strength as an economic powerhouse is coupled with a gigantic boom in consumer technologies, which is shifting all innovation focus toward commercial products; government is no longer spurring innovation as it did in the 1930s–1980s. The global consumer technology market is estimated to be worth $3 trillion by 2020, up from an estimated $1.45 trillion in 2015, according to Future Marketing Insights. India and China are driving new demand, while the U.S. is expected to continue to invest in upgrading established technologies.

  Silicon Valley companies today know consumers, citizens, better than perhaps anyone else. Collectively they know each individual better, in some ways, than friends or family ever could. And certainly better than other industries do. Pharma doesn’t know how often you check your horoscopes. Exxon doesn’t know when you last took Plan B, or if you were traveling in Mexico City, Jaipur, and Shanghai last week, and what information you searched for while there. Silicon Valley’s wealth of rich data on consumers transcends geographic borders and governance. The type of data being accessed is becoming more intimate and comprehensive. Electronic records capture our health and biological data, our bank account information, the data taken from voice recognition commands. This kind of technology can read facial expressions to analyze emotion in real time.

  Silicon Valley also operates in the traditional spheres of influence. It is multinational, as many oil and pharma companies are, and as such has scaled up investment in Washington, DC in step with its rapid growth. It lobbies, it has policy heads, and it has a presence there. But Silicon Valley companies also have a wealth of cultural influence and consumer intimacy to exploit, which creates interesting new tensions. It lobbies like big oil and pharma, but also uses its citizen base of workers and consumers (who are often the same thing) to effect change, even if that means rebelling against traditional government.

  The power dynamic between government and Silicon Valley companies, particularly the bigger brands, continues to shift gears. The large tech companies, compared to other corporations, have shown a greater interest in making political statements, a necessary outgrowth of their self-conscious branding as forces for good (not just for profit). Apple and Google are ranked among Disney and Coca-Cola as the most influential brands in the world. Unlike previous waves of industry, wonder, more than just power, is attached to what they do. And now they are using politics as a marketing tactic. Several of the ten most powerful global brands have taken political stances on issues such as Brexit, personal privacy, and the
2016 presidential election, marking a powerful move toward publicly challenging governments after historically being mostly neutral. It’s a paradigm shift when a commercial brand feels sufficiently confident to speak out openly on a political issue against a government. Leaders from Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft actively criticized President Trump for withdrawing from the Paris climate accord. Patagonia, the outdoor clothing brand, is suing the U.S. government over shrinking protections for national parks. Zuckerberg, not the president of the United States, is meeting with DACA Dreamers. But this activism is linked to their role as consumer brands—they need to show connection to the zeitgeist and opinion en masse, even if a president does not. And on this basis they are being scrutinized in a way that pharma and other corporate categories might not be. Many brands made overtly political campaigns in sync with the 2017 Super Bowl. Airbnb’s #WeAccept, for example, launched after President Trump’s immigration ban against Muslim countries to highlight its own policy of inclusivity. (Though, as a testament of their limits, not one person in the campaign wore a hijab. It’s unclear whether this was a tactical omission—or just stupid.)

  Silicon Valley’s relationship with the government grows more complex when they seek to mobilize their audiences with rallying cries when something goes against their interests, or may stop their members earning income. “You don’t want this! Write to your governor!” Uber has used this tactic to help overturn restrictions and bans on its activities. Airbnb has created a whole platform out of mobilizing its users, or in Airbnb language “community,” to lobby governments on its behalf about renting out apartments and properties, raising awareness and advising customers on whom to write to. Describing Airbnb-ers as a new sharing economy “guild,” it has made a comprehensive strategy out of rallying consumers to campaign for short-term property rentals. It may have heads of policy, it may lobby, but here it also occupies the curiously counter position as “revolution rouser,” except for its own commercial gain. The symbolism is important. Airbnb, a corporation, becomes the champion of the People, not the State.

  This sea change arises from the fact that Silicon Valley wields more financial clout than the U.S. and many other governments; it leads innovation in key sectors the government used to; and it is increasingly taking on key tasks of governance. It’s not just Musk building spaceships. More NASA contracts, and more government contracts in general, are going to Silicon Valley because Silicon Valley commercial companies have more money and are leading more innovation. Which has prompted federal programs to actively court Silicon Valley robotics startups, and acquire stakes in new technologies that could be relevant for military and government use. The driving force of problem-solving and innovation has now flipped. The British Government is turning to Google’s Deep Mind for machine learning for the UK’s health services, and to Palantir for analytics (New Orleans has already reportedly been experimenting with Palantir’s predictive policing techniques). Silicon Valley is becoming the Expert friend—and that power shift is very visible to all of us as citizens. Where once government took us to space, our government scientists built the internet, and our prime ministers strategized war—we now look to tech companies to lead us into the future.

  The tech group is increasingly dominating not only political discourse, but also amplification of that discourse, as an engine of social media marketing for both government and political channels. Campaigns are run on social media, and won. Political news is read, and then distorted, on social media. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram are used for political campaigning now, and have official government pages. Here is another instance where, as data analysts and mobile targets, Silicon Valley minds have become key advisors to government.

  Societies, and many aspects of government, are becoming digitalized, often requiring input from private industries. And as economic growth is being driven by businesses from these sectors, many governments want to cultivate Silicon Valley as a business partner. Barack Obama joked at SXSW Interactive that he wanted to hire every member of the audience. Governments are trying to align visibly with technology because it has become synonymous in the people’s minds with the future.

  On the other end of the spectrum is the wider view. The one where Silicon Valley technologies are ultimately exacerbating all the pressures on governments and eroding their revenues—thus undermining their strength. Automation, robotics, AI are all driving up unemployment. Driverless cars, sensors, and automation will dramatically reduce parking tickets and speeding fines, much-needed channels of income. Platforms like Airbnb are distorting home and rental prices, forcing out lower-income consumers. New technologies are creating a multitude of ethical dilemmas to research, understand, and forecast—but also regulate, putting further pressure on government resources. Widespread drone use alone will need monitoring for privacy reasons. Taken together, it’s death by a thousand cuts, a slow (or not so slow) battle of attrition by “efficiencies” against the slowness and bureaucracy of government. And its slowness, even when deliberate and considered, is being positioned openly by tech rivals as a halt on progress. Who will win?

  Silicon Swamp: The Changing Scene in Washington, DC

  It’s a cold, frosty morning in late December 2016. Many are already in holiday mode, shopping, traveling to families, playing hooky from work to meet with friends. Not Sheila Krumholz, the executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP), a Washington, DC–based nonprofit, nonpartisan research group that tracks the effects of money and lobbying on elections and public policy, looking for conflicts of interest. Krumholz is tired. After months of relentless activity building up to the presidential election, another maelstrom—the election aftermath of President Donald Trump—is creating a raft of new things for her company to track.

  “Our role is to promote the notion that, whatever your position is, you need to have access to information in order to be able to do the basic due diligence, hold government accountable. To make sure policy is based on the merits and not on the money,” says Krumholz, referring to the Trump administration. “Money is flooding into our system. The degree to which billionaires and immensely wealthy businesspeople—who are inexperienced in politics, I might add—are being appointed to the most powerful positions in government is unprecedented.”

  Before Trump’s election, a lot of her focus was on Silicon Valley’s rising influence in Washington. There were headlines about its growing lobbying, the revolving door between the Obama administration and tech giants, and the presence of Silicon Valley generally in the city. And it’s taken something of the magnitude of Trump, the multitude of his potential conflicts of business interests, perhaps, to deflect that.

  “Technology’s presence in our daily lives is so pervasive that we’re surrounded by it 24/7, unlike almost any other interest. We’re not surrounded by insurance, or even so much by fashion or Hollywood. You can barely pass five minutes without using technology, so it’s hard to compare it to anything else. In Washington, DC specifically,” she says.

  But even as the months unfolded in the wake of the election, Silicon Valley leaders became a key part of the new presidency—critiquing Trump, or being criticized for aligning with him. The fact that Silicon Valley’s stances, in either direction, gained bigger headlines than any industrial heads in auto, energy, and finance is telling of Silicon Valley’s cultural influence.

  Private interests and industry lobbying have always been in politics—top spenders in 2016 were the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Realtors, pharmaceutical and medical organizations, Boeing, and AT&T. But there’s now another player at the table: Silicon Valley, in record-breaking time, has contributed an amount comparable to these well-established industries. “We’ve seen their presence grow and we’ve also seen gleaming towers to technology spring up and house Google and all the rest,” says Krumholz, referring to new Silicon Valley offices in the nation’s capital, hubs for their lobbying.

  Alphabet, the holding c
ompany that owns YouTube, Google, and other Google properties in its restructured new form, spent just over $18 million on lobbying in 2017, according to the CRP. Amazon spent $12.8 million. Facebook spent $11.5 million. Collectively with Apple, spending amounted to around $50 million in 2017. In the 2016 presidential race, Hillary Clinton was their top recipient with $4 million.

  Even with Donald Trump elected, Silicon Valley’s influence looks set to continue to grow. Peter Thiel as Trump delegate, campaign donor, and early member of his White House transition team is perhaps the most obvious example of how these ties continue.

  What’s unique about Silicon Valley’s influence in Washington?

  “It’s complicated,” says Krumholz. “They are, in one way, just another industry. They represent jobs, and to the degree they represent jobs, constituents are going to care about them. And of course, they care about the amazing products they produce. But they also have popular appeal. They have wealth, and they have the expertise that the government needs. They are the communications industry. It’s not like agriculture or defense.” Silicon Valley players combine hard and soft power and everything in between.