Catholic Social Doctrine and Open digital revolutions

Correct approaches to real innovation can come from many places.

Back in 2013, I wrote a relatively long essay titled "Catholic Social Doctrine And the Openness Revolution: Natural Travel Companions?" which, in spite of its name, was not addressed only to Catholics. Instead, I thought and still think that it may be quite useful even for people who have no love nor interest for anything Christian, and no intention to change their ways. Therefore today, on Easter's eve, I'd like to share a much shorter version of that essay, as an invitation to think about what should be the real nature, and usage, of digital innovation (for the full story with all sources and citations, please consult the full essay).

First, Openness

I define "Opennes" as the set of attitudes, technologies, concrete practices and legal infrastructures, all driven by principles that include a "share-and-share alike" approach to ownership and reuse of goods and services, characterized and enabled by massive usage of the Internet for affordable, large-scale collaborative design and mutual support.

Some of the best known and most developed real-world applications of Openness are Free/Open Source Software (FOSS), Open Data, Open Access, Open Hardware and distributed, mass-customizable " manufacturing, with open licenses, via 3D printing and similar techniques.

To see the real meaning and value of these applications, let's consider 3D printing, open manufacturing and digital maps (but there are many more examples in the full essay). 3D printing technology is perfect for low or very low volume production, that is the very kind of production that may be appropriate even for (networks of) villages and other small communities in developing countries, with little or no money to invest in machinery. 3D printing also is an excellent way to produce on demand spare parts of obsolete products that may not be commercially available.

With or without 3D printing, Open, collaborative design and manufacturing are not limited to immaterial or small size products or, more generally, non-primary needs of lucky citizens in the most advanced societies. They are also extremely important, for example, for agriculture, as I wrote just one week ago.

Digital cartography and mapping are two activities that can carry (or block) important political messages, and be acts of either exclusion or social self-affirmation. Proprietary online maps may be almost useless in developing countries, if they show every possible detail of "rich" places, but little or nothing of poor ones, because mapping them could never be profitable for a traditional private corporation.

When Open Tech does better than Big Tech: digital maps of Gaza are much better than proprietary ones

The Gaza Strip is a perfect example of both this problem and its solution. In 2013, the Strip looked almost empty on Google Maps, but its ambulance drivers could quickly reach people in need anyway, thanks to OpenStreetMap. Even today, the OSM map of Gaza seems more accurate and up to date than the Google's one. OSM also makes it much easier for linguistic minorities to build and preserve state-of-the-art digital representations of their own land, history and culture, in their own language, with their own symbols.

In general, its characteristics make Openness particularly well suited to address (among other things) the real needs of people.

Second, a short, ad-hoc summary of Catholic Social Doctrine

Based on the Ten Commandments, the Gospel, human wisdom, and science, CSD is "a single teaching, consistent and at the same time ever new" about development and management of society, that only defines general principles: "The Church has no models to present; models that are real and truly effective can only arise within the framework of different historical situations... [CSD is just] an indispensable and ideal orientation." Concretely, CSD has always strongly proposed a society built on Common Good, Solidarity and Subsidiarity, defined as follows.

Common good is defined as the sum total of social conditions that enable human development "on the basis of a balanced hierarchy of values" that maximizes the possibility of what would be authentically good for groups or single persons (real needs, again!), both in the short and in the long term. Participation, that is active contribution to the common good from each individual, is necessary because it enhances society, and because everyone has something to contribute.

Solidarity: human beings are social by nature (which, incidentally, is just what the Web 2.0 meme is all about), but their true unity in society must come from free acceptance of the commandment of Jesus Christ to love one’s neighbor. Consequently, while solidarity implies social charity and mutual support, in CSD it is never a demand for a Welfare State. Its goal is that human persons are not made dependent on the rest of society.

Subsidiarity: placing the human person at the center implies subsidiarity - that is devolution of effective power to "the lowest and most local level compatible with the common good" (which sometimes demands "that decisions which affect many people are sometimes taken at a higher level"). Only in this way each single human being, or association of human beings, can practice as much freedom and responsibility as possible. This is perfectly in line with the will to avoid some "all-encompassing Welfare State." Simplifying a lot, subsidiarity is not mere consultation ("Do you like this law proposal?") but genuine participation ("Shall we write this proposal together?"). In order to respect both subsidiarity and solidarity principles, "the State’s intervention in the economic environment must be neither invasive nor absent, but commensurate with society’s real needs."

Summing up, any society based on CSD would be a society that would help the poor by empowering them through government that is small in assistentialism but "big" in fair rules. Through active participation (at all levels, from family to State) and distributed ownership of means of production, that society should serve the real needs of all its members, both at the spiritual and at the practical level.

Connecting dots

However short, the two syntheses of the previous paragraphs should be enough to highlight that there are many important points of contacts between Openness and CSD. To begin with, both Openness and CSD are not, and never can be, a direct endorsement of any single product, brand, company, country or political system. Nor are they tied to any technology, with one crucial exception for Openness that I will explain shortly. Openness is, first of all, a way of working and regulating some technologies. All the practices and movements described in the first part are:

• legally and deeply adaptable to very diverse, local, real needs and the common good of all their users without special permissions, at the smallest possible cost;

• perfect for decentralization at the lowest possible levels;

• driven by, or supportive of, free and spontaneous initiatives, by individuals and communities, and voluntary, participated work, instead of assistentialism from above;

• not driven by profit, even if they don’t exclude it;

• based on means of production that (at least in the immaterial parts) really belong to all their users, thus distributing ownership at a much bigger and more resilient scale, than would have been impossible even a few years ago;

• usable, and already used, to build tools of peace of all sorts, from tractors to textbooks;

• beneficial even for people without (broadband) Internet access

In the second place, software, which is the technology that makes all kinds of Openness actually accessible to the masses, produces legislation and culture: therefore, understanding the nature of software belongs to any "system" to build a better world as much as to technical curricula, and making certain decisions about software is a responsibility that the heads of every institution cannot delegate to their ICT staff. Similarly, in the modern world, respect for the person should include making sure that each person can choose the software he or she really needs.

Besides, CSD has always advocated a just distribution of means of production. Software and knowledge, albeit immaterial, are crucial, strategic means of production. Their just distribution implies (without excluding private initiative and profit!) their opening.

Connections among globalization, Openness and subsidiarity as in CSD are equally strong. Since the times of Paul VI development in CSD implies active participation of peoples, "on equal terms, in the international economic process." Openness makes this easier, turning globalization, that is access to appropriate knowledge and to the most efficient means of production, to the poor’s advantage. In this sense, Openness seems a bit like globalization done right.

In addition, it is subsidiarity itself, which I may summarize again as "whenever people can do something by themselves, help them to do so!," that requires and contains Openness.

On the same note, and with respect to globalization, Pope Benedict pointed out that the [current] context of international trade and finance limits the sovereignty of States. This lessening of power of the States puts subsidiarity in danger: no State may delegate powers and tasks that it completely or partially lost due to globalization, international trade treaties and intellectual property abuses. By encouraging Openness, States can get back some of their power to offer subsidiarity. Besides, promoting Openness reduces unnecessary costs, freeing important resources for more critical tasks, and increases the free circulation of solutions to real problems.

Today, Open techniques are too often used to build "first world-only" gadgets and services. However, they also seem made to order to fight consumerism and help the poor more efficiently, at the smallest possible cost. Technology for Openness already exists and doesn’t require any "extension" or changes to CSD; in a way, we may say that Openness may be used to implement with ICT the orthodox CSD that already exists.

Another way to express the same concept is that, if we had to build from scratch technologies and ways to use them that match CSD point by point, the result would be unavoidably very, very similar to what is described in section three. So, why do it from scratch?

The Open Revolution is based on technology, and Paul VI and Benedict XVI rightly warned against "the great danger of entrusting the entire process of development to technology alone." Indeed, in general any technology can create new divides, increase exploitation instead of fighting it, or encourage its own idolization.

The Open solutions described here, however, do not depend only on the smallest possible number of technocrats as it happens with closed, proprietary systems! By design, Open solutions not only enable, but encourage all the people and communities using them to "look under the hood," to take control and modify the "machine" until it really suits them, or to ask for help to do that.

Conclusion

Openness is not some "savior" to be idolized in and by itself. It is, however, one of the necessary tools to support real human development. As far as I am concerned, the Openness Revolution also proves the timelessness and modernity of CSD and, in general, of the message of the Church: it’s a bit like CSD had already conceived, decades or centuries ago, solutions so advanced that technology has been able to build the necessary tools only in these years!

That’s why, in my opinion, while Openness is good in and by itself, Catholics have even more reasons than others to promote, teach and use it. This said, the main point and main take-home lesson of this piece is that nothing, nothing you have read here should be considered valid or relevant only for Catholics, including the basic concepts of CSD. Consider these questions, which are generalizations of three questions actually asked by U.S. Bishops almost thirty years ago:

• How can any community call those in positions of power to promote.. decent wages, and greater opportunities?

• How can any community shape the priorities of its culture to promote greater personal responsibility and better economic choices?

• How can business, labor, various levels of government, and NGOs of all sorts, including churches, work together to overcome economic injustice and exploitation in our communities?

What I argue is that first, Openness as defined here is good and necessary, for at least the reasons one may found in CSD, for every belief system or world vision that cares for individual freedom, solidarity and decent answers to the three questions above.

Second, as I wrote even before that essay, "software is too important to leave it programmers" (also here). Does this mean that everybody, Catholic and everybody else, should become hackers or software programmers? Of course not! It just means that everybody should all be aware of these issues and opportunities, in order to vote and act accordingly, in their own interest. After all, as I will never stop saying, "YOUR civil rights and the quality of YOUR life depend every year more on how software is used AROUND you".

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