Cybernetic Revolutionaries: A Discussion

For this installment of our series on Actually Existing Socialism we take a look at an attempt to solve the issues of central planning with a novel experiment unlike any other in history: Project Cybersyn in Salvador Allende’s Chile. In a discussion based on Eden Medina’s book Cybernetic Revolutionaries, Donald, Christian, and Rudy discuss the idea of Stafford Beer and their limitations, the difficulties of the democratic road to socialism, and if Cybersyn is totalitarian but in a good way. Outro music is “Litany for a computer and a child about to be born” by Angel Parra and Stafford Beer.

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