Description

Discussion

David Ronfeldt and John Arquilla:

"Twenty years ago we proposed noöpolitik (nü-oh-poh-li-teek) as a new approach for American information strategy (1999). According to our argument, strategists will have to rethink what is “information” and see that a new realm is emerging — the noosphere, a global “realm of the mind” — that will profoundly affect statecraft. The information age will continue to undermine the conditions for traditional strategies based on realpolitik and material “hard power,” and lead to new strategies based on noopolitik and its preference for ideational “soft power.” A rethinking is needed because the decisive factor in the new global wars of ideas will be “whose story wins” — the essence of noöpolitik. (see: https://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1033.html)

The noosphere and noopolitik concepts relate to an organizational theme that has constantly figured in our work about the information revolution: the rise of network forms of organization that strengthen civil-society actors. Few state or market actors, by themselves, seem likely to have much interest in fostering the construction of a global noosphere, except in limited areas having to do with international law, or political and economic ideology. The impetus for fostering a global noosphere is more likely to emanate from activist NGOs, other civil-society actors (e.g., churches, schools), and individuals dedicated to freedom of information and communications and to the spread of ethical values and norms. We believe it is time for state actors to begin moving in this direction, too, particularly since power in the information age will stem, more than ever, from the ability of state and market actors to work conjointly with civil-society actors.

Ten years ago we provided an update on the promise of noopolitik for a handbook on public diplomacy (2007; 2008). In it, we summarized our 1999 report and added four new points: (1) Other new information-age concepts similar to noopolitik — notably, netpolitik, cyberpolitik, infopolitik — had appeared, but all (including noopolitik) were having difficulty gaining traction. (2) Instead, the concept of “soft power” had come to dominate strategic discourse in government, military, and think-tank circles, even though its definition was flawed and lacked operational clarity. (3) Meanwhile, in non-state arenas where noosphere-building ideas had taken hold, activist NGOs representing global civil society were becoming major practitioners of noopolitik — but the most effective practitioners were militant jihadis organized in global networks and outfitted with sophisticated media technologies. (4) Against this background, we argued that American public diplomacy would benefit from a course correction to head in the direction of noöpolitik. But we also cautioned that conditions for doing so were less favorable than when we first fielded the concept a decade earlier — and propitious conditions seemed unlikely to re–emerge anytime soon.

Implications of the noosphere concept for thinking about noopolitik

David Ronfeldt [1]:

"The foregoing points about the noosphere, some nearly a century old, have implications for framing noopolitik in our era. We mean for the development of noopolitik to reflect a keen clear grasp of the noosphere concept, particularly along the following lines:

The noosphere remains a scientific and spiritual concept. It arose from revolutions in thinking about science and evolution, about complexity and consciousness, about the importance of cooperation as well as competition, about systems and self-organization, and about how the world is becoming evermore interconnected and interdependent. It makes knowledge and reason — the mind — crucial for humanity to attain its planetary potential and address matters that require systemic holistic analyses and answers. The noosphere has become a visionary political concept as well. But it is not a fantastic utopian idea. It’s an evolutionary “protopian” idea — which means expecting “progress in an incremental way where every year it's better than the year before but not by very much” (Kelly, 2011, 2015). Accordingly, the noosphere concept is very much about anticipating and shaping what lies ahead, with a sense of grounded realism as well as hopeful idealism. It is about living within the permissible limits of the biosphere, in part by recognizing and attending to the effects of human activity, so that the biosphere and noosphere are kept in a mutually-beneficial balance. Thus the noosphere concept offers an engaging positive vision of the future; its proponents believe its emergence is the key to the future of humanity. OR https://www.edge.org/response-detail/26062

The noosphere concept is embedded with value orientations that its originators deemed best for protecting the biosphere and creating the noosphere. It means to favor views that are ethical and ecumenical, that seek harmony and mutual goodwill, that value freedom and justice, pluralism and democracy. It calls for the world and its cultures to be open and inclusive, in ways that foster unity and variety, a collective spirit as well as individuality — all in order to foster an “inter-thinking humanity”. It is a pro-humanity anti-war concept. As Moiseev said, “entering the age of the noosphere requires the practical reconstruction of the worldwide order and the establishment of a new thinking, a new scale of values and a new morality.” (BNR, p. 171)

From the beginning, the noosphere’s emergence has been a function of revolutionary advances in information and communications technologies across the centuries. More recently, and thus less noticed, yet increasingly important for the future, is that the noosphere’s growth is also a function of the development and distribution of all sorts of sensory apparatuses that will enable what McLuhan aptly called an “externalization of senses”. This revolution in sensory technologies is in early phases, and its maturation is surely essential for the noosphere’s growth.

The noosphere concept carries a set of standards for strategy. This is clearest if strategy is understood not only as an art of relating ends, ways, and means, but also as an art of positioning for spatial, temporal, and actional advantages. Then, valuing the noosphere strategically means thinking and acting in global/planetary ways (spatially), while minding long-range future end-stakes (temporally), and creating new means or forms of agency to shape problems and opportunities at all scales (actionally).

Moreover, the noosphere concept, like the biosphere concept, has long implied an end to Westphalian realpolitik-type thinking that nation-states are the most important actors and that material factors matter most. Now, in the information age, other actors and factors increasingly matter more. Reflecting this, proponents of the noosphere helped inspire the establishment of “noospheric institutions” such as the United Nations and UNESCO, as well as Green Cross International, and a range of activist civil-society NGOs (BNR, p. 184-185). The time may come when aspects and/or parts of the noosphere are defined as belonging to the “global commons”.

All these points about the noosphere apply to our vision of noopolitik. In a grand sense, the purpose of noopolitik is to prepare the way advantageously for the age of the noosphere, while also protecting the biosphere and geosphere.

In a more practical sense, our early definition of noopolitik still reads well, even in light of our updated analysis of the noosphere concept:

In sum, noöpolitik is an approach to diplomacy and strategy for the information age that emphasizes the shaping and sharing of ideas, values, norms, laws, and ethics through soft power. Noöpolitik is guided more by a conviction that right makes for might, than the obverse. Both state and non–state actors may be guided by noöpolitik; but rather than being state–centric, its strength may well stem from enabling state and non–state actors to work conjointly. The driving motivation of noöpolitik cannot be national interests defined in statist terms. National interests will still play a role, but should be defined more in society–wide than state–centric terms and be fused with broader, even global, interests in enhancing the transnationally networked “fabric” in which the players are embedded. While realpolitik tends to empower states, noöpolitik will likely empower networks of state and non–state actors. Realpolitik pits one state against another, but noöpolitik encourages states to cooperate in coalitions and other mutual frameworks. In all these respects, noöpolitik contrasts with realpolitik. (2007) [2]

All this implies that the noosphere begs for strategic thinking. Yet we’ve seen arguments that a key component of the noosphere, cyberspace, is “ill-suited for grand strategic theories” — the challenges it poses and the technologies it rests on are said to be changing too rapidly and too uncertainly for such thinking, at least for the time being. Do such arguments also apply to the noosphere? We think not. By comparison, the noosphere is a more complex, vastly larger, indeed cyberspace-encompassing “space” — and it too is evolving uncertainly, though maybe less rapidly. And the noosphere is even more difficult to pin down than cyberspace. Yet, our view, along with the views of others we discussed above, is that the noosphere does lend itself to grand strategic thinking. In our case, that means advancing the concept of noopolitik. [Martin C. Libicki, “Why cyber war will not and should not have its grand strategist,” Strategic Studies Quarterly, (Spring 2014, pp. 23-39), p. 33.]

Besides, let’s notice that U.S. policy and strategy have long aimed to “assure access to and use of the global commons” — its land, sea, air, and space domains — and that cyber has lately been added to that set of domains. Thus cyberspace now seems increasingly headed for grand strategic theorizing. It makes sense to expect the noosphere, in at least some respects, to eventually be deemed part of the global commons. Indeed, viewing the noosphere from a global-commons perspective may help with framing and specifying what noopolitik is all about." (Jasper, Scott, ed., Conflict and Cooperation in the Global Commons: A Comprehensive Approach for International Security. Georgetown University Press, 2012.)

(https://twotheories.blogspot.be/2018/03/notes-about-noosphere-and-noopolitik-6.html)

Status

2018

David Ronfeldt and John Arquilla:

"Today, another ten years later, as we prepare this new update, noopolitik remains a promising concept for American information strategy. However, it’s not alive and well here in the United States, where even “soft power” is lately in decline as a strategic concept. Instead, our major adversaries are the ones working on developing noopolitik — but in dark ways and by other names — and they’re using it against us. These new circumstances mean, paraphrasing Charles Dickens, that we are now living in not only the worst of times but also the best of times for revisiting the promise of the noosphere and noospolitik.

So, we’re doing this update differently. Our initial writings analyzed at length the importance of information in the information age and the nature and growth of three information-based realms — cyberspace, the infosphere, and the noosphere. We did so in order to recommend that strategists begin to prefer the noosphere concept. However, by now the importance of information and those three realms are conceptually more familiar to strategists. Thus, for this update, we are skipping over re-summarizing our initial analysis and diving straight into discussing the noosphere concept at length — its origins in the 1920s, and the spread of its influence through today, nearly a century later.

This update proceeds this new way partly because we have learned more about the concept. We have also found new implications for discussing the prospects for noopolitik. We then go on to provide a new assessment of noopolitik for America’s current strategic situation." (https://twotheories.blogspot.be/2018/02/)

More information

Our original RAND report, titled The Emergence of Noopolitik: Toward An American Information Strategy (1999), is available here:

https://www.rand.org/pubs/monograph_reports/MR1033.html

Our follow-up paper, “The promise of noöpolitik” (2007), which summarizes the RAND report and was edited down for the chapter in the public diplomacy handbook, is here:

http://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/1971/1846