30375: Bick (reply) RE: 30360: Jepiem (ask) Re: 30354: (a reply) from Math Jay re cell phones (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

paulbick@msn.com

Well Stuart, as it so happens, cell phones don't care what you think about
them - they're here to stay!  I agree that cell phone culture can be
annoying in the extreme - but that's a different discussion.  And I
wholeheartedly agree with your point that sometimes it's the oldest
technologies that fit a given context best - and sometimes it's the newest.
I'm neither a free-market determinist, nor a techno-utopian, and you're
absolutely right - cell technology, especially in "developing/developed"
transnational contexts is in the stone age - but lets a give it little time,
shall we!  5 years ago there were very few cell phones in Haiti and no
cell/sat infrastructure to speak of. Now, as several posters have mentioned,
cell phones are everywhere and one can generally find a working cell phone
in even the remotest corners of the country.  On the other side of the
equation, the Haitian State has had a hundred years to develop reliable land
telephony (or water, sewer, electric, roads, garbage removal, security, etc,
etc...) and yet the system has been in the same irreparable shambles it has
been in for decades.

By "organic" I was referring to the eager - almost spontaneous adoption of
the technology as it became available. Call it a corporate "exploitation" if
you want (of course it is) - but the Haitians I know love their cell phones
- and the new sense of connectivity they have. Cellular "fits" Haiti - in
many ways better than it fits here.  Here, we already had a perfectly
functional telecommunications system before cellular came along.
Technological redundancy is luxury for rich countries - and arguably more of
a curse than a blessing.  It tends to increase both the technological
dependency and the likelihood of disappointment with each new layer.  In
America now, we're so wrapped up in our technologies - their many layers of
proprietary redundancy, their mobilities, infinite promises and endless
disappointments.... Devices become obsolete before we know how a fraction of
the their features work.  Technology has become just another form of
disposable identity - in a country where the endless and pointless retooling
of purchasable identities is the national religion.  We're constantly being
told that we need more - and we always agree.

Clearly the state itself is Haiti's greatest obstacle.  Whether we call it,
"failed," "corrupt," "predatory," "politique du ventre" -- the Haitian state
is an unrepentant vacuum into which money, energy, and hope have been
disappearing for generations.  I don't believe the state is "broken," I
believe it follows its "real" mandate to the letter - with increasingly
optimal efficiency.  The state does exactly what it was designed to do -
consume as much as it can of whatever resources it can lay hands on, always
toward the maximum limit of its reproducibility - and this is precisely why
it can't be repaired. As Derrida suggested, the destruction of any "center"
immediately produces another center on the terms of the first.  Its, out
with the old, in with the new old.  We've seen it happen so often in Haiti
and all over the globe, that it has become almost a truism now.  Beyond the
corrupt state there is another corrupt state.

The point is, as you so rightly suggest - technology, whether brand new or
centuries old must be well-suited to realities on the ground.  The reality
on the ground in Haiti - the 900 pound gorilla - is the state.  To the
degree that any technology can tip-toe around the state, (and none will be
able to do it completely) that technology necessarily begins with a distinct
advantage over those which must be chewed, swallowed and passed through the
belly of the beast on its way to the consumer - what comes out the other end
is usually of considerably lower nutritional value than what went in.

Cellular/satellite technology has more flexibility and adaptability to roll
with changes and uncertainties on the ground. It doesn't need to rely on
other (broken) infrastructure components nearly as much as land service
does, and its off-site delivery by largely global providers keeps much (not
all) of its delivery stream out of the old kleptocracy machine.  Also - it
will get faster, cheaper, deliver more, and get more reliable every year -
as the land infrastructure continues to decay...



Paul Bick
Department of Anthropology
The University of Illinois at Chicago
Behavioral Science Building
1007 West Harrison St M/C 027
Chicago, IL 60607

847-863-8725