Technical vs cultural solutions
I think there are two types of solution to social problems, which for now I’ll call ‘technical’ and ‘cultural’ (other name suggestions welcome). Some problems can be solved with technical solutions alone; some with cultural solutions alone; and other problems need both. If a problem needs both types of solution, it’s a mistake to over-prioritize one category of solution at the expense of the other.
What are technical and cultural solutions?
Technical solutions are top-down, cultural solutions are bottom-up.
Technical solutions can be implemented by a single powerful person, though they are more often implemented by a small-ish group of people; cultural solutions involve the majority of people in a given culture changing their attitudes and behaviour.
Technical solutions are small, limited tweaks that have big effects on the world; cultural solutions are large, sweeping changes in a cultural mood.
Technical solutions are technocratic; cultural solutions are anarchist.
Technical solutions are Platonist, cultural solutions are Epicurean.
A cultural solution involves lots of people changing their minds about something in such a way that it changes people’s experience for the better - for example, collectively agreeing that it’s not ok to call people slurs, or punch people who anger you, or abuse children.
I count governments passing laws as ‘technical’, because (in all current systems of government) a small group of people are in charge of passing laws. However, political technical solutions are clearly related to culture: if an attitude becomes widespread in a country’s culture, politicians will respond to this; and legislative changes can themselves influence culture.
A technical solution to homophobia might look like ‘legalize same-sex marriage’. A cultural solution to homophobia might look like ‘encourage people not to have homophobic attitudes’ or ‘teach people that they shouldn’t assume a random person’s partner must be of the opposite sex’.
A technical solution to poverty might look like ‘unconditional cash transfers’ or ‘universal basic income’. A cultural solution to poverty might look like ‘stronger norms of substantial mutual aid or charitable giving’ or ‘stronger stigma around hoarding wealth’.
A technical solution to sexism might be ‘develop the contraceptive pill’ or ‘give women the right to vote’. A cultural solution might be ‘stigmatize sexist attitudes and violence against women’ or ‘hire qualified women to do traditionally-male occupations’.
The two types of solution interact: technical solutions are sometimes developed under the pressure of culture; and often once a technical solution has been developed, culture needs to change in order for it to be widely implemented or used.
If you care about social problems, you neglect either category at your peril. Of the two main altruistic ideologies I’m attached to, leftism and effective altruism, leftists maybe tend to underrate technical solutions, whereas effective altruism (EA) tends to underrate cultural solutions. This is kind of understandable in both cases, and I can imagine both camps claiming that this is a feature, not a bug.
EA is about having the biggest impact for the smallest cost. Since technical solutions can be implemented by fewer people — in extreme cases, by a single very wealthy philanthropist — it will generally be easier — and therefore cheaper — to develop and implement those than to bring about broad cultural changes. An EA might say “I’m not against cultural solutions, but you’d have to persuade me that trying to change loads of people’s minds on this issue will be more cost-effective than lobbying for regulation to improve the conditions of millions of chickens, or buying anti-malarial nets, or any other technical solution.”
Meanwhile, leftists might say, “of course we prioritize cultural solutions! These so-called ‘technical solutions’ are technocratic, anti-democratic, and creepy. Small groups of people deciding to ‘fix’ the world seldom ends up going well!”
My anarchist, anti-paternalist soul does have considerable sympathy with this, and therefore considerable scepticism of a certain class of technical/technocratic interventions. On the other hand, I can think of some technical solutions that don’t threaten liberty and that would be at home in an anarchist utopia, for example:
developing green technologies to reduce our impact on the climate
developing social technologies that improve wellbeing, mental health and relationships. I’d claim, for example, that psychological/relational techniques such as non-violent communication, internal family systems, and cognitive behavioural therapy are technical solutions.
developing ways to capture the benefits of markets without the drawbacks of our current version of capitalism
developing artificial wombs, so people can reproduce without anyone having to go through pregnancy and childbirth
Sometimes people just come up with ingenious hacks to make the world better, and we should embrace that!
Similarly, I have sympathy for the optimising EA perspective, but I think that EAs could stand to pay more attention to cultural solutions and cultural problems.
What do you think of this distinction?