388
PARTISAN REVIEW
technical knowledge and in which the most imponant mallers are
sellied by commissions and not by the deliberations of general
parliamentary assemblies, adequate control cannot depend on gen–
eral approval and thorough-going publicity. Exactly the same holds
true for the various spheres of cultural life, which in the main
require such a refined special knowledge that irresponsible chatler
has neither controlling nor guiding value.
It
is very probable that a
planned society will provide cenain forms of closed social groups
similar to our clubs, advisory councils, or even sects, in which
absolutely free discussion may take place without being exposed to
premature and unsatisfactory criticism by the broader public.
Apart from the secret and elitist presumptions of those who wish
to control the future, there are other beliefs shared by colonizers of the
future. They believe that there is a discernible, causal, nondialectical
relationship between individual human actions and the probable
responses to those actions. Hence, it is unnecessary to explain or
understand people in psychological or aesthetic terms since it is
assumed that they operate only as objects and interchangeable units
within organizations. Futurology and planning encourage the devel–
opment of knowledge and facts so that prediction will result in
consequential behavior. Thus, when futurologists attach themselves to
corporate institutions (business, government and military) their pre–
dictive analyses are intended to have practical con equences. To ensure
the proof of the prediction, the social organization is then
arr~nged
in
such a manner as to fulfill the predictive prophecy. We are assured that
the best we can hope for is finding means to manipulate the social
structure so as to avoid extremes. People, things and structures are
objects in problem solving. People live what might be called "lived
lives " and therefore it is unnecessary to consider a moral component
since we have no chance to exercise any moral judgment. By the nature
of society, we are not free and each choice is a tragically ambiguous one
to be made by elites.
Some people believe that there is both a soothsaying and a harsh
prophetic quality to futurology. The art of soothsaying has always
been important to the psychology of any palace court and in Washing–
ton, fortune-telling conducted by palmists and soothsayers is a flour–
ishing business. However, the prophetic aspect of futurology, the
warning that God will punish man for his injustices if he does not
repent and reform, has long since been cancelled out. Moreover, the
derivation of the term itself does not seem to suggest stern moral
exhortation. The term "futurology" was coined at the end of the
second world war by Asop Flechtheim, who, like Mannheim, intended
