Varn Vlog
Abandon all hope ye who subscribe here. Varn Vlog is the pod of C. Derick Varn. We combine the conversation on philosophy, political economy, art, history, culture, anthropology, and geopolitics from a left-wing and culturally informed perspective. We approach the world from a historical lens with an eye for hard truths and structural analysis.
Varn Vlog
Reimagining Economic Systems: The Role of Design in Democratic Planning with Eric Meier
Can art and design reshape the future of our economic systems? Join us for a compelling conversation with Eric Meier, formerly Greta, co-founder of the International Network for Democratic and Economic Planning, as we explore the unexpected marriage of aesthetics and economic ideologies. As we move beyond the cold, impersonal visuals of Soviet-era command economies, discover how new representations of democratic economic planning are emerging, particularly in recent German publications. Eric shares insights on how to align the aesthetics of economic models with present-day sensibilities, offering fresh perspectives on visuals that once seemed archaic. Meier's exhibition can be seen here.
Witness how the revival of retro internet aesthetics like Y2K and Frutiger Aero are not merely nostalgic trips but transformative tools in making complex economic ideas more approachable. Eric talks about the potential of these styles to shift perceptions and engage a broader audience in a dialogue about democratic planning. We explore the importance of eclectic and imaginative imagery in diminishing notions of elitism and totalitarianism, highlighting how visual storytelling can render abstract political concepts tangible and relatable.
We also critique early 20th-century command economies and their aesthetic footprints, juxtaposing brutalist nostalgia against innovative Southern Hemisphere architecture. The conversation turns towards the limitations of market economies and how technological advancements offer new solutions, reshaping consumer choices and simplifying experiences. Eric’s personal journey through various sectors underscores the vital role of aesthetics in shaping both perception and participation in economic planning, emphasizing the power of design and data visualization to inspire and educate. Join us as we reimagine the visuals that define our economic narratives and explore the potential of art and design to craft a vision of a more democratic future.
Crew:
Host: C. Derick Varn
Intro and Outro Music by Bitter Lake.
Intro Video Design: Jason Myles
Art Design: Corn and C. Derick Varn
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twitter: @varnvlog
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You can find the additional streams on Youtube
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Hello, and I'm here with Eric Meer, a former guest on the podcast, although a long time ago, under the name of Greta. We were talking about something completely different than what we're talking about today, I think. Originally we were talking about theories of war and now of the aesthetics around democratic economic planning, and you have co-founded an international network called the International Network for Democratic and Economic Planning in depth, which sounds cool, because I like when the acronyms are pronounceable um marketing indeed um.
C. Derick Varn:So we're going to talk today a little bit about the aesthetics around um, uh, art, design and and economic planning, which is not a commonly discussed thing. I mean, one of the things that I think your exhibition is aimed at getting at and then I'm going to let you contextualize it a little bit in a second but is to get away from this idea that everything is like Soviet God's plan and it's all socialist realism or it's nothing. There's no aesthetics at all, just pure technocratic brutality, and you want to move, I think you want to move the needle there. So tell us a little bit about your exhibition.
Eric Meier:Yes, want to move. I think you want to move the needle there, so uh tell us a little bit about your exhibition. Yes, first of all, super thanks for having me on after such a long time.
Eric Meier:I'll actually uh try my best to uh make the connection between like strategy war and stuff to later on in the podcast, but that kind of stuff is like still in the back of my head and like has, uh, has relevance for what I'm doing now but as a teaser for later and um, yeah, so to give a little bit of context for the exhibition um, so I've been engaged in this like space around, like new models of democratic economic planning, like your listeners have probably heard about. The people's republic of walmart book like, which is like the most famous one. I think that has popularized that discussion. And then you have like the classic models, like with from people like participatory economics with robin hanel, like the cyber communism of like paul corkshot, etc. And that was like a third one, which was the third one, uh, whatever, uh, there are like classic stuff and, um, in recent years, this discussion has become like really, really, really lively and which is super, super cool. And, uh, I've been following it for like around let's say, five years now on the sidelines, like I'm not like a super specialist who's like okay, I understand every model, every aspect of it in depth totally, but I have like a good overview, knowledge and I'm very interested in like hey, see how this space develops like not only theoretically, but also, what are the connections to like real world developments, parties, etc. Etc.
Eric Meier:And, um, yeah, so last year in the summer there was like I'm based in germany, uh, it was like a kind of like a huge publishing wave in big German newspapers which aren't leftist Like, they're like sometimes leaning quite conservatively, and it was about, let's say, like five to six articles that were all talking about like democratic economic planning, talking about like democratic economic planning, and all of them like, let's say, first of all, they were talking about the idea of that, like not super specific aspects of it, but the general idea, and all of them were at least, let's say, neutral or balanced, and none of them was like, okay, these they're like just bashing the whole thing of like, oh, oh, my god, this is like in Germany, the GDR is like the first reference point that comes up. So, on what the article said, like that was also the time when the Evgeny Morozov podcast, the Santiago Boys, came out, so there was good overlap with that. But, um, uh, in essence, the articles were quite like surprisingly positive, let's say. But all of the images, all of the images, like you know, like, uh, when articles have like their header pictures that you also see as preview pictures on social media when you post the link. Um, they were all either super abstract and you didn't know what to do with that, or it was actual pictures that were associated with like the gdr, like lines of, like the, the trappies, the, the one, uh, model of auto, of automobile that was produced in the gdr.
Eric Meier:And so, even though the articles were like, okay, this was kind of like a huge step that I didn't expect, was like okay, who reads the full article, someone who's super interested by it?
Eric Meier:And 95 of people only see the picture and read the title and that's how, that's how the image of what is being talked about and the tone, et cetera, et cetera, is being formed, like that's what sticks. And so I was like, okay, it's kind of fucked up that we have like these really bad aesthetics associated with these articles. And then I was thinking, okay, but what would be like an alternative? And then I was thinking, okay, but what would be like an alternative? And it was super hard to come up with one because the yeah, let's say like the overall aesthetics that are associated, that we find in this discourse are, yeah, not great. Let's say it like that. And then we come to the okay also. Like you have like a little bit of not really a revival of socialist realism, but it's like sometimes you have this aesthetic of okay hair, so like roughly soviet aesthetics, but make it with computers like oh uh, vapor wave socialistism or something like, yeah, it goes in that direction, sometimes like, and um, also has like this, like weird nostalgic bent it then.
Eric Meier:And then you have like the, which is kind of similar, even though it's like a little bit more modern, the oh uh, where the walmart book reference comes in, like let's do amazon or walmart but make it socialist, like, oh, big computer will plan the economy. I don't know, maybe you or some of your listeners have heard about like the big computer mafia meme, like a few. If yeah, a few years ago in twitter there was yeah, it was was a group chat on Twitter or something.
C. Derick Varn:My old colleague, Douglas Lane, wrote a whole book about the big computer. It's called Bad Trash Revolution. He thought it was a utopia. All the reviewers thought it was a dystopia. Anyway, back to the thing.
Eric Meier:I'm only recanting or like like taking stock of, like, okay, what are the aesthetics in this space?
Eric Meier:And then the other one is like cybersyn, yeah, which is which is the most interesting one, because it's also the newest to most people, because cybersyn is, like, in the wider, wider public, still quite unknown, but it has the same problems. It's also nostalgia. It has the same kind of melancholia of, oh, 50 years ago there was this historical possibility and if things would have turned out differently then we would have a completely different world by now, probably. But this window of opportunity is gone and everything we can do is kind of like remember it, mourn it, kind of like, but there is nothing genuinely new pointing to the future, anything that's like really exciting and relatable and, uh, so those are kind of like the three big, established, let's say, aesthetics that people can't. I feel like it's just like the repertoire that people kind of like fell back onto because that's what's circulating in their circuits already. And I was like OK, this is like a big strategic political problem. We need to think more about our relation to aesthetics and how, yeah, and that's how stuff started okay, so how?
C. Derick Varn:what was the initial response to your, your exhibit?
Eric Meier:oh, um, yeah, also like super quickly for listeners, uh, the like there will be a link in the show notes where you can watch the exhibition. And it's kind of like three parts exhibition. Like one part was kind of like the taking stock of the ah, and the one aesthetic that I forgot was basically one that is like abstract diagrams of like, for example, these like planning models. And then I had a middle part which was kind of like um, okay, uh, I wanted to. I I either took already existing artwork from people that I found that I thought was cool and thought, hey, you can make text commentary how that relates to democratic economic planning, or I actually commissioned some people to do something in their style and say, okay, hey, mobilize your own associations, don't go deeply into the theory. And the last part was like just my own experimental stuff. And I think the first part, because it was already established, was something that people felt like make the most sense out of. The middle part was like very exciting, I think, for a lot of people because it was really like um, let's say it's a lot of contemporary internet aesthetics and like also goes into, like plays around with um, the revival of y2k aesthetics and a revival of like a consciousness for the frutiger arrow design paradigm, which was kind of like the tech design paradigm from like very early 2000s to like late 2000s, early 2010s, and I don't, to be honest, I don't really know what people made of my own stuff like I think that was the most disorientating, at least what was cool.
Eric Meier:People were like, hey, I can connect to this thing, to this one piece, and there was never really where people were completely dumbstruck and didn't know what to do with it at all. And, um, I feel like the more I talk about it, the more I write about it, the more I also get like a confidence to also say, hey, this is not just weird shit that I'm doing, but this is like genuinely important and interesting. And yeah, uh, there was an interesting, interesting, uh thing. So we have like a reading group here in bonn, germany, about democratic economic planning and on the local may festival we had like a little the most nerdy lefty thing you can probably do, like having a little stand where you promote your reading group, like yeah, that kind of thing. And the guy who organized the reading group said, hey, why don't we put like some of your art stuff like on like a little wall, so it gets eyeballs really good, conversation opener, because like it's like, so stylistically like eclectic and not like not your classic leftist socialist aesthetics at all but.
Eric Meier:I think that was what drew people in there. It wasn't like, oh, this is like the new branding kind of thing, but like it was completely. This was different, this was different, this was different. But that was its strength. I always thought like this eclecticism was its weakness, because we think like, oh, aesthetics must be like a consistent thing. That's like one concept, like kind of like an avant-garde kind of thing. Oh, there's like one idea behind all of it, and then you kind of like that idea then gets like aesthetically manifested and turned out that was a strength. So that was an interesting feedback.
C. Derick Varn:So I guess the question for a lot of people would be why is thinking about the aesthetics of democratic economic planning or socialism important beyond the obvious? I mean, the obvious is like, yes, you got to get something to get someone to read an article, you need, you need a picture and they need to click and that's, and it's gotta hit them immediately. But but what are the other ramifications of aesthetics?
Eric Meier:around, yeah, so. So, basically, beyond like the pure marketing aspect of propaganda, yeah, yeah, okay, purely, you use yeah, um, yeah, I think there's a lot, um, I'm trying, like I, I'm gonna try to give like the the most pre-formulated answer. It's kind of like something like uh, um, yeah, like something like a ready-made answer I have in my mind that's basically okay, um, when you have a, when you have a discussion like, for example, the stuff around democratic economic planning, which is like very abstract, very theory heavy, very concept heavy, which makes it intrinsically inaccessible to people who don't have the background, etc. Etc. So then if you then say okay, hey, you get into a certain kind of political situation where that can actually gain traction. This situation makes it very likely that this will be politically branded as like oh, this is just another elite discourse and all of the possible bad associations will be put onto that. If it's not like, if it's just oh, then it's like oh, the elites are going to try to to plan our economy and then, like, all of the totalitarianism associations will like pop up again and yeah and um, so it's like the core of democratic economic planning must be okay, people need to be involved In one way or another.
Eric Meier:That doesn't mean, okay, hey, you have it like everyone is involved with everything. That's not possible. But like involved to a certain degree and having kind of like an aesthetics where it's like okay, think about it as like an architecture render, where it's like, okay, maybe have like a text or like an abstract diagram of oh, this is how the, for example, like your factory, your office, etc. Etc. How that would work in this process, and that's very abstract. And when you have something like an architecture and something like a visualization, then it's more concrete, of okay, this is what that would mean for your everyday life, this is how would it be like to like this is to work in such an environment, to be okay, what does it mean? How your work environment is like embedded into this, like larger planning process, and so it gives it more of a like, it's more imaginable in people's minds, and so this, the image, kind of like works.
Eric Meier:It is now just one type of image you might say, like what I said, like the parallel is like an architecture render, so it's like very naturalistic, it's like just a literal depiction or like that's as adequate as possible, an approximation of depicting how that would look like um, you might also say like a simulation, like whatever word you might want to use for it and that can give people kind of like a vibe check, so to say of like, okay, do I like what's presented to me here or not, which? If you only have this like super abstract discourse that you don't understand at all, you, you aren't able to have a vibe check on it like, do I like this or not? And so the visual dimension in the, in this regard, opens up the discourse for people to have a word about do I want this or not? And maybe also to like navigate okay, what do I like about this, what do I not like about this? And I think that's what I and that hopefully, hopefully, this can then like be integrated into the whole like, yeah, model discussion. Yeah, that's for now. I, that's For now. I think that's my first answer to this. Maybe I can iterate on it and find other aspects on this.
C. Derick Varn:Well, I mean, I guess one of the emphasis on economic planning that you're putting in here as a kind of socialist planning is that it needs to be democratic. That's in the title. So aesthetics both has to be democratic, like that's in the title um, so aesthetics, both has to be appealing but also communicative, right? So it's got to do both and that's kind of a a challenge. So, yeah, um, do you think that the? Do you think that this approach, you know, kind of broadens it out from, like the lee phillips and I forgot who else wrote that Republican Romance book.
Eric Meier:I have it, michael Rosovsky, michael.
C. Derick Varn:Rosovsky yeah, I have it right here, and are the kind of Paul Cockshot, which is a very Soviet, slightly cybernetic model, soviet, slightly cybernetic model. I guess there's also Paracon, which okay, but it is a form of democratic economic planning. For those of you who are not participating, participatory economics, I don't know. So so, uh, hmm, you, you mentioned that there was discussions on this, though, even in conservative uh outlets or relatively conservative outlets like mainstream outlets. What do you think is getting people interested in economic planning right now?
Eric Meier:that's a good question, I think, like in terms of observing kind of like. Okay, I think there are a few things. I think one of the key experience in recent times was just the covid pandemic, and seeing that, like that the state has the capacity to like intervene, and intervene quickly, urgently and on a large scale, like doesn't mean that, okay, all of the COVID, all of like everything that the state did with regards to COVID was good, or that it was even in the interest of like people and not in the interest of like capital. Like, sometimes, protecting the health of like capital, like sometimes sometimes protecting the health of people is also good for capital, and sometimes, if you're like an essential worker, a frontline worker, like fuck your health, you still gotta do your stuff, like because, and um, yeah, it basically it showed to people, okay, hey, there, hey, there is this capacity that I think people didn't have any recent memory. Like, maybe you might say, okay, hey, the financial crisis of like 2008, etc. But that was like it was very divorced from your own life. It was like, okay, intervention into like financial markets, but that's kind of it and yeah, it's not as direct as with covid, I think.
Eric Meier:Then it's like the uh, climate change, uh, uh, economic, ecological crisis, where it's like, okay, things don't seem to be so good, the market doesn't really seem to be so good, the market doesn't really seem to be delivering on that, and people are like asking more and more. Okay, like, yeah, what else is there? I think that is also related to like this revival of industrial strategy kind of thing. Like lots of discussion like industrial strategy kind of thing like lots of discussion like industrial strategy like the ira, this chips and sciences act in the us with biden, etc. Etc. Like that doesn't amount to economic planning yet, but it also it. There is this revival of okay, we don't just let the market do its thing, but there's actual steering of the economy by the state, at least as a goal, and that has real political relevance right there, and so that's a big thing. And I think also, let's say, at least in the more technical nerdy circles, the technology part is a really big one With the state of computers, computing, maybe AI I don't know enough about AI to really say, okay, this is true or not but yeah, questions like okay, like okay, hey, can't we have something else than the price mechanism that might kind of like embody trade of relations between different goods better than money and the price, and um, I think it's a bunch of stuff that like comes together and um, yeah, I would. I think that's kind of kind of about it and it's really interesting to see also the development of that.
Eric Meier:Like a few years ago, this was like a super, super niche topic, like super niche, like I don't know. I was at the general intellect unit podcast, for example, also talking about the exhibition they I think have been. They started in like 2018 or something, and I think all of this or like a good chunk of this there was. Also. There was an overlap between, like the end of what you would call, like the left, acceleration is discourse. The, the, what is it? The inventing the future by Nick Shurnik and Alex Williams yeah and um, yeah, and kind of like that kind of like fizzled out, uh but they just quickly to actually kind of like rose very fast, it would weigh very fast, it was kind of fascinating.
Eric Meier:Yeah, and kind of like rose very fast, it would weigh very fast. It was kind of fascinating, yeah and um. There I think a lot of people, like in the podcast sphere, for example, kind of like took up that, the, the fragments of that discourse, and said, okay, hey, let's concentrate on this like technology and economic planning part and go a little bit more in depth there. And yeah, over the last few years, like also shout out to the Future Histories podcast by Jan Gross, who had like a big, big role in really building like a community Like he had. Basically you know how Hideo Kojima makes like pics with like famous actors and musicians.
Eric Meier:Jan Gross basically is like okay, hey, here's another podcast guest, here's another podcast guest and he has really built like a community, especially if academics let's be honest around this podcast. And yeah, but this stuff has been incubated over the last few years and people are coming. This had like a certain avant-garde function, but this stuff has been incubated over the last few years and people are coming. This had a certain avant-garde function, I feel like. And now, yeah, it's spreading more and more.
C. Derick Varn:That's my observation. It's interesting because we can't blame the spread of that on COVID exactly because it was very when I first started. I mean I'd heard about Cyberston since probably the early late 90s. I wasn't even a leftist yet when I first heard about it it was kind of misrepresented though. I mean because it's actually like when Allende's big development was actually in socialist planning was actually the Codona system more than the computer stuff. Stanford beers computer stuff was promising but they didn't fully roll it out ever. So, like some of the, some of the gains that were attributed to it were actually based on other social technologies, you know, and it would have made those work more efficiently if they'd have thought about dealing with the military. I guess that's one way that relates to our prior topic.
Eric Meier:That's half of the message that, like Evgeny Morozov pushes in his the Syntagoboys podcast. That like, okay guys. That like evgeny morozov pushes in his um the syntago boys podcast. That like, okay guys, think a little bit more seriously about the military and about, like the threats, like they are not, they are not afraid to to make their hands dirty.
C. Derick Varn:Like that's a reality you have to deal kind of definitionally for military. It is something to think about. The other thing I remember was around 2010 people started really looking at not just Gauss plan and for my audience who doesn't know, gauss plan was what they actually did for Soviet planning but there was also all these soviet cybernetic developments that were kind of concurrent to what was being worked on by norbert uh wiener and people and they weren't really picked up, mostly for military. And again, the military was part of the reason why the military was paranoid about the security threats so um, and when the, the development of the soviet personal computer was stalled because the military was paranoid about security threats, like um, but they actually had, you know, they figured out a lot of this stuff and not implemented it and and in fact some of of it was studied by Norbert Wiener and the people around him and that's part of what they brought over.
C. Derick Varn:And American planning and cybernetic system is kind of indebted to Soviet, but the Soviets didn't really use it that much. So hmm, I guess the next question is like when I looked at your some of what you aesthetically what came out of that project, some of it was from like memes around capitalist stuff, and then other pieces looked almost identical to things I'd see around like vaporwave aesthetics. I mentioned that earlier. Um, what do you think drives a lot of these aesthetic, these aesthetic choices and presentation around, around this stuff? I mean, that's a huge question, I know. Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Eric Meier:I mean, I can only speculate. I can talk about, let's say, the aesthetic influences. Maybe that's a question.
C. Derick Varn:That's where we go there.
Eric Meier:That's probably a better question I can answer than speculating how people choose this like, um, uh. So, yeah, as I said, like there's huge, huge influences from like like the revival of like y2k aesthetics and um, uh, for for everyone to break it super down, like basically we have like okay, yeah, what was it Like in the 80s, or maybe like early 90s? Like just like Memphis, like just like really pastel colors with like geometric shapes, like the funky stuff, and Y2K aesthetics is like okay stuff. And y2k aesthetics is like okay, not only, but also like lots and lots of chrome, like if you think about electronics that have like translucent plastic around, uh as the shell where you could look into, uh, look inside, so you see the circuit boards and stuff, and um, yeah, and there's been like a real revival of y2k aesthetics, um, especially in fashion in recent times, but also in, I would say, like digital art and um, like in specific circles that I follow on twitter, they have like all of all of what they're doing and all of the variations is like different versions of like having like a spiky metal shape or like a very, very smooth metal shape behind like a weird background, and all of that is like different variations of that and um, yeah. And then there's like the next kind of like paradigm that came after y2k is like the frutiger arrow paradigm and maybe some of you have like seen like like videos about frutiger arrow have really popped off recently on youtube, like, and there's a kind of really this retrospective of like hey, why, why does this thing look so familiar, but also so like far away, time wise? And it's like really this um like, if you see especially aesthetics from like big tech companies like google, apple, etc. Like, uh, when you open google search and you see like yeah, they always have like some graphic on top of something and the way they, for example, portray humans, it's like this super cartoonish, but also like very flat, very like only monochromatic colors for one shape and but then also like distorted proportions, like you know what I'm talking about and that's what kind of what's kind of like the contemporary design paradigm. You also find that in like ui stuff, um, and oh my god, what was the name? Uh, oh god, I know now I'm forgetting the name. Um, yeah, if you say like flat corporate design, there is like a specific kind of um, specific kind of uh design name for that. But basically, yeah, that stuff. And then it's like, oh, but what was before that? That was frutiger error.
Eric Meier:Very, lots of blue and green tones, lots of like the tone of like nature, but also like, oh, the web and like global civilization and like a very kind of like let's say, like a naive, somewhat utopistic, like promise of the future. It's like very in line with like the emergence of like social media, silicon valley and all, and like this whole oh, social media will bring about global, global democracy and everything will be fine, like. It's very in line with that kind of like, with that kind of like ideological promise and that's very interesting for people to like. They also have like, oh, this is what I I mean, you're a good chunk older than me, so this does not count for you but like, uh, people my age, like I'm 27, um, they look at this youtube videos.
Eric Meier:It's like, oh, this is the stuff that I've seen like in my like childhood and a little bit later in childhood, and this is what I grew up with. And it's like lots of like also, your emotional connection to this kind of stuff like this is this is kind of like the promise that you had when you grew up about the future. And then bam okay. Mid-2010s flat corporate design.
C. Derick Varn:Yeah, everything loses, like all of its. I mean, now we have corporate design to the extent that the flat corporate design which was designed to be easily read on an iPhone iPhone has now changed physical design, like, like, like. One of the things that's happening here in the United States is fast food restaurants. Ubiquitous here, right? Yeah, they're not as ubiquitous in Europe. The kind of logos that you would see on an app are now used as signs, so they're not as ubiquitous in Europe. The kind of logos that you would see on an app are now used as signs. So they're one color matte.
Eric Meier:Ah, yeah, that's yeah.
C. Derick Varn:So this aesthetic that started as an internet removal of that has now spread to the real world and actually even affects the way these buildings are built, so that they you walk in, you hit a screen. There's a bunch of uncomfortable looking chairs that look vaguely like a hipper version of the 70s view of space. It's also a hipper version of like the 70s view of space and, like you know, it's also like my interest as an old person.
C. Derick Varn:I didn't say that, no it's okay, I didn't mean it like that. No, no, no, I do For listeners. The big joke is I comment on my age all the time, um, but as a person who was born in the eighties, vaporwave aesthetics is interesting to me because it influences that period that you're talking about. Uh, that uh, but the other thing is it? It actually goes back to a time where we weren't really optimistic about the future, but there was still a vision. There was still like a vision for what it was represented aesthetically, both grimdark and not, and after around the mid-aughts you don't see a lot of that. So, like, even in the mid-aughts, there's like you know, I like to call it like the-ification of everything, but you have that design period and some of that's appealing. I mean, it's somehow like if your iBook merged with Ikea. That's what it looks like.
Eric Meier:Oh my God this is now giving me nightmares but you know what I'm talking about, I know but it's like what you were saying, like this kind of like, let's say, this approach, like the oh, everything comes from, everything comes from this, like one big store and it's kind of like branded by like, all of like. Also, like I feel like you see, this type of stuff like sneaking into every more parts of our lives, like this is more of a vibe. Right now I don't really have like specific examples, which isn't the best thing to say, but, um, uh, yeah, and I, I, I get what you mean. I get what you mean. Um, I also needed to think I need also to laugh a little bit with ikea, because, um, there's like an artist. Uh, like, also, I'm quite new to art, let's say.
Eric Meier:I kind of like got into this earlier last year, like that's what, and I also realized that, okay, well, I guess I kind of always like this stuff, but I never called it art or like never art proper, and I always felt very uncomfortable in museums and still kind of do. For me, art was always associated with just like oh, that's something for old elitist people, like, because where I grew up in the small it was, that was what it was basically, and but, yeah, there was this also like. At the same time I got into art earlier last year I came across this musician, uh, james ferraro, and he's like super, super influential and I love him and he has like like a bunch of albums, but like one album which, like the big, uh, the big part is like kind of albums but like one album where it's like a big part is kind of like just certain like somewhat distorted synth, ambient synth melodies in the background. Then you have like one of these like old AI text-to-speech generators and that's just busting out certain buzzwords, certain keywords, and one of them is IKEA refugee tent.
Eric Meier:Of these like and they're like um, like you have these like weird synths, the started synths and then there's like text like early 2010 spec text-to-speech generators and it's kind of like, uh, summoning this like super, super dystopian, like oh, this is how, a humanitarian crisis, kind of like. Yeah, I bet there is like something like an ikea refugee tent, like not that that's bad, but it's in terms of like the normalization and like I think you get what I mean like the yeah, yeah, like the oh the customer streamlining everything. Just shout out to James Ferraro. I was lucky enough to actually meet him and see a live concert by him in Cologne last year where he played in a church and his recent stuff is with synthetic monk chants and that was kind of a vibe in that environment too.
C. Derick Varn:So I want to lean into. We've been talking about democratic economic planning. Maybe we'll shift to that for a while and get back to aesthetics, but let's talk about what it isn't. On the In-Depth Network's About page you talk about why you reject early 20th century command economies. But can you go into a little bit, a little bit uh about that, and then I think we might talk about the aesthetics of command economies, because I do think that's actually interesting. So, um, why do, why do you guys reject command, uh, command economic planning?
Eric Meier:yeah, um, first of all, I can say like I'm not the best one to make like any theoretical uh oh, this is why it's bad, like I'm not the person to make the best. Take out of it just as a prelude, um, but basically, uh, I think one point is certainly like okay, the lack of like actual democratic input. When you have like a certain kind of like okay, isolated party bureaucrats basically, where, like there's much, like, there's a lot of dimensions to it, okay, like basically you don't really have like democratic input where like, okay, this is what people want, that this type of stuff actually goes into the plant, actually starts playing like a huge, huge role in what kind of decisions are made in terms of like investment, but also in terms of like stuff like consumer goods, um, when you have a structure where you have like a very isolated party bureaucratic elite, um, or like that they are entangled in like really, really bad incentive structures like, for example, the, the factories, where it's like okay, hey, it's um, like, you have so many information problems. I'm sorry that I'm like jumping back and forth a little bit, but you have like stuff like information problems, like how do you ensure that in a planning system, uh, factories also deliver reliable data about like okay, how many resources do they need, what are they producing, etc. Etc.
Eric Meier:And if you have kind of like a like, kind of a punishing system of, oh, if you don't meet your target goals, then you get punished in one way or another, of course it makes sense for the factory to like intentionally set like the target goals really really below. Then what is what they're probably gonna achieve? So like they overshoot it and like oh, hey, that's great, you, you, um, did a really good job then, uh, but then if you have that for every factory, like there's like such a distortion of information whereas, like one of the big arguments of the planned economies thing is like okay, hey, something like the market and prices really really distort information because price is like first of all, price is always recalculating and always approaching, let's say approaching, let's say like uh, approaching, representing um trade of structures like demand and demand and supply, but it's never like, it's always in flux. And um, let's say like the, the social interaction of selling and buying are like these computational processes whereby like okay, hey, what kind of prices actually should be on the market are like computed and that takes a lot of time. It takes a huge, a huge amount of time, and so the point is like okay, hey, if we could calculate these trade-off structures, maybe in money, maybe not, I'm agnostic about that.
Eric Meier:Um, we could like have something like we could have these trade-off structures and supply demand structures much, much better, much, much quicker, much more adequately represented. But that isn't possible when you have all of these fucked up information problems with all of the incentives, with all of the bad incentive structures and that's like. That's kind of like a technical problem, but one that's also intertwined with, like, the political and organizational problem and, um, uh, yeah, that's kind of like I think that's one of the one of the good points where it's like, yeah, it's not genuinely democratic and also not being actually democratic has also, on the technical level, really bad consequences, for does this thing actually work and does it deliver what it promises on? Yeah, that's my answer for now, I think.
C. Derick Varn:Yeah, and what do you think that kind of command economies does to the aesthetics or the appeal? Because I think one of the things you and I would say is aesthetics do matter, like, they're like. Um, they matter for a variety of reasons, but not just. I don't think it's. You know just what, just what people think, and and I, I even think the Soviet union understood that, at least by the, by the, by the sixties and seventies, but at that point they were, they had all these other problems. So, um, like, like, uh, what kind of aesthetic choices do command economies tend to make? I mean, everyone has. There's this weird nostalgia for brutalism, but I always like yeah, that just comes from the fact you have to build a lot of buildings with concrete really fast. They're going to look a certain way.
Eric Meier:I might add, I know the especially in like, let's say like, especially in like, let's say like, kind of internet-influenced communist circles. There is this like huge people love brutalism and I think it's a little bit like I know it's a counterforce against like, oh my god, commie, blogs are so ugly and look what, what, what socialism or communism does to our like beloved housing and stuff. Um, oh, aren't, aren't american suburbs the ideal way of living? Good, like I understand that it's counterforce against that. But I think it's also kind of like cope, like I don't, I don't like soviet brutalism, like I like the monuments and I like like the bus stations, but I think like brutalism or brutalist influence architecture in like, especially like in the southern hemisphere and uh, so much, so much more interesting, like african brutalism, like you have like south american brutalism. The buildings look a little bit different, just as like an aesthetic choice like indian. India has also like super interesting brutalism with like the parliament, but like obese and stuff and like of course there are also histories of like Soviet influence, why these buildings look a certain way but, yeah, have a little bit of like heat, a little bit of like plants around it and things have like a completely different vibe to it and like completely different aesthetics, appearance.
Eric Meier:But yeah, oh, my god, about the aesthetic choices of, yeah, to be honest, I've never really asked myself. They seem very downstream from like the practical requirements in terms of production. Like, okay, like you pump out mass goods, like mass produced goods that all look like very similar, and because pump out mass goods, mass-produced goods that all look very similar, because it's kind of rather easy in terms of being able to plan for it versus planning for a lot of variety, then you have the problems with, okay, one of the downsides was not having that many and not that innovative consumer goods, yada, yada, um. But um, yeah, I don't. Yeah, to be honest, I don't really have an answer to that question because I've never really asked that myself. Like, um, what I find interesting maybe is the I had like a couple of pieces on that in my exhibition uh, the question of what you might call interface design and data visualization.
Eric Meier:Like um with otton o'rough, um, who, uh, uh, otton o'rough wanted basically like a picture language, like a symbolic language that could communicate economic plans to everyone, and we're talking like early 20th century, so like lots of people also illiterate, and we're talking completely different levels of education than nowadays. We're talking completely different levels of education than nowadays. And he developed with two other people I don't remember their names right now, but with two other people just like isotype language, which we now maybe also call pictograms, and these then were used to visually like certain production plans, for example, and that's, I would say, it's like an early version of data visualization. And then where it's like okay, hey, this enables people to there we come a little bit back to what earlier with like okay, what's the role in, we might say, what's the role in aesthetics, in also planning itself, it makes people understand like it's a certain kind of visual complexity reduction of okay, it makes you understand something that you weren't able to understand before and, given on that understanding that you then have, give a certain kind of feedback if the communication pipelines for that are there, the whole.
Eric Meier:The isotype approach was also utilized by the people who did the half of socialism game, which is like a planning game, and yeah, they also like Otonoirof is kind of like having like a big revival at the moment. Yeah, so it's like that's not command economies. Yeah, they also like OtonoiRef is kind of like having like a big revival at the moment. Yeah, so it's like that's not command economies, but like it's kind of like how aesthetics intertwined. I would say like more on a design level here, like really of like, okay, they're part of like a design and less of like aesthetics as like something that's. Yeah, I don't know, yeah, maybe I just think the word design fits a little better here.
C. Derick Varn:Yeah, Okay, so what can we say about the seeming? Go back to some in-depth principles. You also talk about the rejection of market economies and why and okay, that's obvious when we're talking about like capitalism, but you also reject market socialism. Could you go into why there?
Eric Meier:Yeah, like also same upfront comment basically as before, but like the fundamental thing is like, basically, okay, hey, if you don't have like democratic macroeconomic coordination, so something else than the market, then, um, even though on the internal level, like, even though internally a corporation might be structured democratically, which is cool and which is a great step, it still has to deal with like these, like, um, emergent constraints where it's like okay, hey, you have to like maximize profitability, you have to. Then you go into a certain kind of like self-exploitation because of these like outside, outside constraints and um, yeah, like that's basically simply because, like, the forces that, uh, how to say that? Um, that affect, even like from the outside, even the internally democratically governed corporation. These are not like the product of any kind of intentional process and lead to negative outcomes.
C. Derick Varn:That's to make it like super quickly, uh, yeah so, basically because there's still certain competition outcomes, it's going to still have some of the same negative outcomes that would normally happen and even under a socialist mode would state with a democratic control, like a co-op control of the corporation, and with state incentives. So so one of the things that you're basically rejecting is is the idea that markets are particularly good information sorters.
Eric Meier:At least when you put that point in general. Right, like, maybe there might be like like. I tend to have this, um, uh, I tend to have this very agnostic which which might, which might make sounds like a little bit of of okay, hey, I'm just like yeah, I don't say anything about this, to not say anything wrong, but more of a little bit of an agnostic approach in terms of like, okay, you know, let's kind of see what works. But I don't really like, I think, having at least like the minimal position of like okay, at least on like a macro scale, on like a like really it's like macro economic coordination scale markets, like just it's not the way, like that's not, yeah, and maybe in like very constrained circumstances they might have certain advantages, and then it's kind of like okay, let's find that out. Like that's my minimal position.
C. Derick Varn:I would say here yeah, so one thing I would maybe add to that a little bit is the kinds of problems that markets seem to solve, for we now have developed other technologies that can solve for them. That would have been a much harder in the 19th century. I mean absolutely Um, um, I mean before, seven, eight databases and all that it's. It's very hard to account for. Uh, you know multiple inputs and and you know different preferences, um, one thing that it leads me to think a lot about is that in the aughts there's a bunch of american libertarians who were talking about like well, what are the one of the? The things about capitalism is you get a diversity of of products that meet different aesthetic needs and you have choice in that and you have a large range of choices in that, and there have been time periods where that's been true. I don't want to say it's always false, but there are time periods, like right now, where that is not true, like choice constraints, actually highly constrained right now.
Eric Meier:It's also, yeah, super quickly it. I think it's also not like uh, a point that you should say, okay, hey, that's like that's what you might say, like in itself desirable, that like or that it's even like widely desirable by like lots and lots of people like sometimes it's also like, okay, you have like so much choice, like um, I know everyone who has ever like shopped for like specific technical stuff, like for pc or like for a phone or something, and you have like like tech reviews online exist for a purpose and like basically you have like like tech reviews online exist for purpose and like basically you have like so you have to do so much work to also figure out what are the minute differences between these different products. And that's work. That's work and time that you put in there. And it's kind of like a little bit of a surprise game in the end of the thing of if the thing is going to hold its hold, its promise, or not.
C. Derick Varn:And which is why a lot of people use brand sorting without doing that research right, even though that's not really a rational thing to do.
Eric Meier:But yeah, but yeah, it's a time saver true, yes, it is, and um also like there's an interesting. For example, there's an interesting little cooperation here in germany, or at least where I'm around, which is called Picnic.
Eric Meier:It's nothing new. It's kind of like okay, you have an app, you go through your app and select your groceries that you want to have, and then they deliver these groceries to your door, but the thing is they a very shrunken down inventory of stuff that you can choose from. So, like not much choice, not much choice. And I think they also like they source their stuff basically from other big grocery stores and it's basically okay, hey, you are, and it's basically okay, hey, you are, and it's really successful. Like basically, because you don't have kind of like this overload of choice and because it's just these like essentials, like groceries, where it's like okay, hey, you know, I kind of know what I want, I kind of know what I want and who the fuck cares if I have like a choice between, like I don't know, five different types of paprika or two. Like that's fine.
Eric Meier:And so, yeah, maybe now you can go on with the story that you started. But I just want to interject, like, okay, even today you can kind of like see, hey, you know sometimes having less choice in a world that's you can kind of like see, hey, you know sometimes having less choice in a world that's like so kind of like information overload and like, oh, you have to make little choices here and here and there. Sometimes not having to choose what kind of grocery you buy at that moment is fine. It's actually a relief, and maybe in certain services we see that people actually crave for that and they even pay sometimes more money in order not to have to choose.
C. Derick Varn:Well, thinking about the two European-style grocery stores we have in America, which is Audi and Trader Joe's, they're both actually Audi, they're different Audis.
Eric Meier:I heard about American Ollie.
C. Derick Varn:And what?
Eric Meier:I've heard of it is that it's a different beast. That, oh, it's a totally different beast.
C. Derick Varn:I used to work at all the here like, yeah, I put like now I work at riva as a cashier another grocery, uh store chain but I put like in the early morning before the store actually opened, like we put, uh, we sorted through like the vegetables and the fruits and like what was still good and put new stuff in and yeah, I had like half a year of permanent sleep deprivation because of that yeah, but what is interesting with a lot of people like about uh, about those two stores, is relatively little choice, decent quality selection, and they just go there and buy what they need, um, and as opposed to, say, walmart, where I can tell you, when I lived abroad for for uh, I mean even and I lived in capitalist countries for the most part when I lived abroad for almost a decade when I came back to American Walmart I nearly had a panic attack.
Eric Meier:I was just like why are there three aisles of shampoo? This is oh my God. This is so no Like, oh my God. I've worked way too much time of my life in grocery stores. Um, now that I'm realizing, um, like I did, I did a gig work for like a whole year like um, but not like um, like delivery gig work, but basically like an app where you had like different jobs for each day and it's kind of like, oh, today you work at a grocery store filling in the shelves. The next day you work at like a clothing store folding clothe. Other like I also worked in like a like a logistics factory which was fucking hell like logistical facility, kind of like somewhat amazon style.
Eric Meier:Um, but yeah, what I realized, realized in grocery stores like is especially the big ones you have this aesthetics of abundance, like you're never allowed to kind of like let the customer see, oh, there are only like this and that like many bags of chips left. It always needs to look. Of course, there's always a limited amount of chips on the shelves, but it always needs to look as if it doesn't make any matter like it if you take one of them, or like it always has to like overflow, almost. And like this aesthetic, like really how that was, like in um, how to say that? Like created this aesthetics of abundance, like you stuff as much stuff in there as possible was like super. And I've never been to an American supermarket. I really want to. I've never been to the U S. I really want to go to the Walmart.
Eric Meier:It's a weird dystopian place to go to the Walmart.
C. Derick Varn:It's a weird dystopian place. I have a love-hate relationship with the French theorist Baudrillard, but Baudrillard's description of America actually is somewhat apt. So I was thinking about this and choice, paralysis and aesthetics. And yet if you're having a democratic, if you're having democratic inputs, then, to go back to where we started, what is the function of aesthetics? To get people to engage in a democratic form of economic planning.
Eric Meier:I think that probably also has multiple aspects to it. Again, I'm going to start with, let's say, like, the instrumental, propagandistic one, because, like, that's the easiest one. Um, in terms of like, simply, I think what's what really, uh, bugged me about the way, like the, the aesthetics that have been circulating in the discourse so far Around democratic economic planning, like that we talked about earlier Was this they were so charged with associations Of people that were super off, putting Like, I basically asked To say a little bit cringe. But I basically think, okay, you have to operate on a vibes basis, which basically means like, okay, what are the associations that come into your head when you see something? And so the aesthetics need to like, respond to and embody, like and speak to like the hopes, fears and dreams of people. Like, um, this now sounds like super simple, but kind of like, okay, it needs to conjure up like a vision of okay, this is kind of like a life, like living in such a society, living in like such an economic system might be something closer to the good life than what I have now. Like, hey, okay, this might not end up in like it should also address, for example, the fears of dystopia. I think you should not kind of like because, like, the idea of a planned economy is just like so, so drenched in these associations with dystopia, with, with totalitarianism, yada, yada. It should address that. That's important, I think. But it should not like, it should not purely be on the defensive and address these, but also of like, okay, hey, look, there can be these associations of like, hey, of there can be hope there can be.
Eric Meier:Like, hey, what if you could have democratic input into the economy, be that on like a small scale, in terms of like what you're consuming, be that on your own work, at your own workplace, which is probably like one of the biggest parts for people. Or be that for like macroeconomic investment types, decisions with regards to like energy transition and that type of stuff. Or like, hey, what kind of like transportation do you want to have? And, um, so kind of like the aesthetics have to play that role of to say it stupidly, sell people that idea, to like really communicate, hey, this is what would be possible, this is how your life could look like then in this case and I think that's like the number one aspect and then you might say, okay, given we had some form of like democratic economic planning that would we would live in such a society, in such an economy, and, um, what role would economic, what would would aesthetics play to get people engaged in the planning process?
Eric Meier:I think they're stuff like really stuff like interface design and like data visualization, which now sound very like design, techie kind of way. But I think that will just play a big question, a big role, because it's like okay to kind of like communicate planning data, for example in your own corporation that you're working at, and like, hey, what's your own planning data? What's the planning data of your sector, for example? Uh, like your economic sector, and uh, to be able to make decisions there. And for that type of stuff you need like data visualizations, you need good interface design. And that sounds very boring, that sounds very like not exciting, nothing really artsy kind of stuff. But I think that this also doesn't mean oh, we can like interface design our way out of capitalism.
C. Derick Varn:I'm not saying that, I just say stuff like interface design and data visualization should not be outright rejected or put off as like oh no, this is not important. No, I think anyone who works in technical communication or informatics knows that you have to do those things like, um, capitalists know you have to do those things, um, and so the idea that we don't, can don't think about that as uh, something out of capitalist society to utilize to help people plan, is a little weird.
Eric Meier:I mean, it's just, yeah, it think about it in terms of like, okay, interface design kind of determines how you as an individual, uh, or like maybe like a group of people in your team, in your corporation or something how you interact with a system much, much larger, much more complex than you and that you would otherwise probably not really under, that you will never completely understand, but other, but otherwise almost not at all understand. And interface design is kind of like okay, how do you translate this into something that's like cognizable to you and that's like, oh, given this knowledge that this thing gives me now, this interface, I can now make decisions and also, through that, intentionally influence the system that's's much larger and more complex than me, and on the most abstract scale. I think that's what interface design is kind of about. And, yeah, that's important. Yeah, I would agree, yeah.
C. Derick Varn:All right. Well, I think people should check out your exhibit. It will be in the show notes on this channel and, for those of you listening, it will probably be in the show notes on the podcast too. I would like you to plug anything you want to plug, eric.
Eric Meier:Yeah, let me think, yeah, you want to plug eric? Yeah, um, let me think, uh, yeah, maybe we can also put like my link tree in the show notes, which is just kind of like okay, we knew that my some my socials will be in there, like recent either, like articles, podcast appearance, appearances, etc. Like, yeah, and also everyone like, if you think anything I talked about here is even remotely interesting and you want to get in touch with me about that or about InDepth, feel free to get in touch with me through social media. Whatever, I'm happy about that and also thanks very much for having me on.
C. Derick Varn:Thanks for coming on. I'm actually very interested in the overlap between aesthetics and socialism. Other than another podcast about how socialist realism is actually better than I think it is. I mean, look, I like the good 30s era poster, but there's a limit to that the good 30s era poster.
Eric Meier:But there's a limit to that anyway. Um, I have a certain poster of a certain not, not, not, not soviet figure, but like another another communist figure right behind the monitor. Right it's like half, like half ironically, because like the aesthetics of propaganda are also like very interesting and like meshed into like like modern day collages of things. They are also interesting and it's the perfect thing, is like from amazon and it's like a like there's these super cheap amazon printouts and it even has like the, the file name printed onto the, onto the thing. Wow.
C. Derick Varn:That's funny and we'll leave on that little bit of commentary.
