‘Designing Freedom, Regulating a Nation: Socialist Cybernetics in Allende’s Chile ‘Eden Miller Working Paper #34 Program in Science, Technology, and Society “Massachusetts Institute of Technology January 2002On November 12, 1971 British cybernetician Stafford Beer met with Chilean President Salvador Allende to discuss constructing a computer system of unprecedented sophistication. For Beer, the meeting was of the utmost importance; the project required the President's support, During the past ten days, Beer and a ten member Chilean team had worked frantically developing a plan for anew computer system, one capable of transforming Chile’s economy to reflect the socialist principles of Allende’s presidency. The project, later referred to as, "Cybersyn" in English and “Synco" in Spanish, would network every firm in the expanding, nationalized sector of the economy to a central computer in Santiago and enable the government to respond to economic crises in real-time. Although Allende had been bricfed on the project ahead of time, Beer was charged with the task of explaining the system to the President and convincing him that the project warranted government support. Accompanied only by his translator, a former Chilean Navy officer named Roberto Cafiete, Beer walked to the presidential palace in La Moneda, while the rest of his team waited anxiously at a hotel bar across the street. "A cynic could declare that I was left to sink or swim,” Beer later remarked, “I received this arrangement as one of the greatest gestures of confidence that Iever received; because it was open to me to say anything at all."' The meeting went quite well, Once they were sitting face to face (with Cafiete in the middle, discretely whispering translations in each man’s ear), Beer began to explain his work in "management cybernetics," a field he founded in the early 1950s and cultivated in his subsequent publications.” At the heart of Beer's work stood the "viable system model", a five-tier structure based on the human neurosystem, which Beer believed existed in all stable organizations—biological, mechanical, and social. Allende, having trained previously as a pathologist, immediately grasped the biological inspiration behind Beer's cybernetic model and knowingly nodded throughout theexplanation. This reaction left quite an impression on the cybernetician. "Lexplained the whole damned plan and the whole viable system model in one single sitting...and I've never worked with anybody at the high level who understood a thing I was saying. ‘The conversation continued for several hours. Beer acknowledged the difficulties of achieving real-time economic control, but emphasized that a computer system based on a firm understanding of cybemetic principles could accomplish technical feats deemed impossible in the developed world, even with Chile's limited computer resources. Once Allende gained a familiarity with the mechanics of Beer's model, he began to reinforce the political aspects of the ive, and anti- project and insisted that the system behave in a “decentralizing, worker-partci bureaucratic manner.”* When Beer finally reached the top level of his systematic hierarchy, the place in the model Beer had reserved for Allende himself, the president leaned back in his chair and said, "At last, el pueblo”. ‘This succinct utterance, characteristic of Allende's political idealism, reflected the President's staunch belief that the project would empower the Chilean citizenry and become a useful part of the "people’s government.” By the end of the conversation, Beer had secured Allende's blessing to continue the project. This curious meeting warrants further explanation, although given the personalities of the two men the unorthodox topic of discussion might not come as a surprise. Neither Allende nor Beer was a stranger to controversy. Allende had attracted worldwide attention since 1970 after he defeated his opponent Jorge Alessandri by a slim 1.3% margin of the popular vote, becoming Chile's first democratically elected socialist leader and the first individual to attempt socialist * Stafford Beer, Brain of the Firm (New York: Joha Wiley and Sons, 1974), 257. * Wiener himself christened Beer the “father of management cybernetics." » Stafford Beer, interview by author, tape recording, Toronto, Canada, 15 March 2001. “ Brains of the Firm 257. 5 ibid, 258. El pueblo wanslates to “the people”. The mesting between Allende and Beer constitutes one of the most popularly printed ancedotes ofthe Cybersyn projec, always constructed from Beer's agcount. Here I have retold the story drawing from Beer's account in Brain of the Firm and personal interview conducted with Beet at his home in ‘Toronto, 15 March 2001,transformation through peaceful means. A socialist since the age of twenty-four, Allende entered politics fighting for his cousin Marmaduke Grove Vallejo, the Air Force Commander who became Chile’s first socialist president for a short-lived twelve days in 1932. After establishing a branch of the socialist party in his hometown of Valparaiso, Allende quickly rose through the ranks of the party and was elected to Congress in 1937. Always in favor of socialist reform through existing democratic practices, unlike many of his more radical contemporaries, he pushed for a Leftist agenda from the Senate rather than from the shop floor. He has been described by historian Peter Winn as “short and bespectacled, a notorious womanizer, and mediocre public speaker,” but a man who projected an image of "dignity and concem”.’ An ¢temal optimist, Allende never doubted the success of his experiment with democratic socialism, even as the Chilean political situation spun centtifugally and the economy continued to decline. Like Allende, Beer also broke with convention and in the late 1960s began channeling his efforts toward the creation of a better world. He never received a formal degree; his undergraduate studies in philosophy were cut short by mandatory military service in the British army during WWI Following the war, Beer entered the steel industry and ascended rapidly to the management level. In 1950, a friend serendipitously handed Beer a copy of Norbert Wiener’s seminal publication, Cybernetics. Reading the book changed Beer's life and spurred him to write an enthusiastic letter to the famous MIT mathematician detailing his application of cybernetic principles to the steel industry. Wiener, unfamiliar with the business world and intrigued by this new application of his work, invited Beer to visit him at MIT. ‘Thus, without any academic credentials, Beer found himself amongst the academic elite of the cybernetics community and eventually became an informal student of Harvard biologist Warren McCulloch and a close friend to Wiener and MIT electrical engineer Heinz Von Forrester. An independent Peter Winn, Weavers of Revolution: The Yarur Workers and Chile's Road to Socialism, (New York: Oxford 4thinker, Beer once gave a paper entitled "The Irrelevance of Automation” at an international ‘automation conference, an occasion that reportedly convinced Von Forrester the British did indeed possess a sense of humor.’ In line with his beliefs as an “old fashioned Marxist", Beer tried using his understanding of cybernetic principles to bring about social change, as evidenced by a series of lectures he gave between 1969 and 1973 that he later published as the volume Platform for Change Known for his long beard, the ever-present drink in his hand, and his habit of smoking 30 cigars a day, Beer cultivated an image that, in one journalist's words, resembled a “cross between Orson Wells and Socrates"? At face value, a meeting between a British cybemnetician and a Chilean president, particularly one as controversial as Allende, seems most unusual. It suggests that cybernetics, an interdisciplinary science encompassing "the entire field of communication theory, whether in the ‘machine or in the animal," achieved a significant level of importance during this period of Chilean history.!° However, most discussions of cybemetics to-date strictly focus on the evolution of the field in the U.S. and the European contexts and do not address how these ideas ‘migrated to other parts of the world such as Latin America."! This paper will first present an ‘explanation of how cybemetics entered Chilean consciousness and attracted the attention of the nation’s President. Froma different angle, the meeting between Beer and Allende illustrates the importance of both technological soundness and political ideology in Cybersyn’s construction. Although the project was technically ambitious, from the outset it could not be characterized as simply a University Press, 1986), 68. 7 Stafford Beer, interview by author, tape recording, Toronto, Canada, 15 March 2001. * Stafford Beer, Platform for Change, (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1975). ” Michael Becket, “Beer: The Hope of Chile", The Daily Telegraph Magazine, August 10, 1973, 7. "Norbert Wiener, Cybernetics: or Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1948), 11.technical endeavor to regulate the economy. It would make Allende’s socialist revolution a reality~“revolutionary computing” in the truest sense. Moreover, the system had to accomplish this goal in a manner ideologically coherent with Allende's politics. As this paper will demonstrate, the tensions surrounding Cybersyn’s design and construction mirrored the struggle ‘detween centralization and decentralization that plagued Alende's dream of democratic socialism. Throughout Allende’s presidency, Chile's political polarization strongly influenced. how individuais from both the left and the right viewed the Cybersyn project and its role in Chilean society. The interplay of cybernetic ideas, Marxist ideology, and computer technology found in the project illustrates how science and technology shaped Chilean ideas of governance during the early 1970s and altered the possibilities for socialist transformation, Examining this multi-faceted relationship in greater detail will constitute the second goal of this paper. According to historian Brian Loveman, "More has been written about Chile between 1970 and 1973 than about all the rest of Chilean history.""? In spite of this wealth of literature, little is known about the Chilean government's experiment with computing technology during this time period and less about its contribution to Chilean socialism.” Thus, the final goal of this paper: writing technology into one of the most widely studied periods of Latin American history. ‘On one hand, documenting the construction of this system illuminates the extent of Chile's technological capabilities during Allende's presidency. More importantly however, the project "Although little attention has been paid to cybernetics in Latin America, scholars bave addressed the development ‘of eybernetic ideas inthe Soviet Union, mest notably Vyacheslav Gerovitch’ unpublished dissertation, "Speaking {Gyberetically: the Soviet remaking ofan American science” (Ph.D. diss, MIT, 1999). # Brian Lovemnan, Chile: The Legacy of Hispanic Capitalism, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979), 346. This should not imply thatthe project has not been documented. Beer published his account ofthe project in the last five chapters of Brain ofthe Firm, as well as in the last chapter of Plarform for Change. Arman Mattelart and Hector Schamucler’s book Communication & Information Technologies: Freedom of Choice for Latin America (Norwood: Ablex Publishing Corporation, 1985) has devoted several pages of text to the Cybersyn project. Project participants, such 2s Rail Espejo and Hermann Schwembcr, have also published their account of Cybersyn in international cybernetics journals. Discussions ofthe project have similarly appeared in publications such as Science for People amd New Scientist. "These, however, are all publications dedicated to science and technology and not to documenting Chilean history during the Allende period. 6brings to light numerous unexplored tensions within the Popular Unity coalition, Chile, and the intemational community at large. For this reason, examining this technological project promises to enrich our understanding of this complex moment in Chilean history. Chilean Cybernetics ‘The origin of cybemetics has been well documented, consequently this paper will not present an in depth history of the field’s development.'* However, previous scholarship has shown that cybernetics grew out of a WWIL project to create anti-aircraft servomechanismns capable of accurately aiming weapons at the future position of an enemy aircraft. This problem led Wiener, Julian Bigelow, and Arturo Rosenblueth to develop a theory of predictive feedback contro! capable of making predictive calculations from an incomplete set of information, which later evolved into a theory for self-corrective control that many believed could be applied in both ‘machines and organisms. Attempts to bridge the mechanical and the biological appeared as early as 1943 when Rosenblueth et al. wrote, "a uniform behavioristic analysis is applicable to both machines and living organisms, regardless of the complexity of the behavior." This conviction laid the foundation for cybernetics, a new interdisciplinary science that strove to apply concepts from mathematics and engineering—such as statistical modeling, information theory, and the feedback loop—to a myriad of systems, including those outside the mechanical and biological domains. ‘Humberto Maturana provided the initial kink between Chile and the cybernetics ‘community, Born in Chile in 1928, Maturana studied medicine at the University of Chile and } For a more in depth treatment ofthe origi of eybernetis, refer to Paul Edwards, The Closed World, (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1996) and Stove Heims, The Cybemetics Group (Cambridge: MIT Press. 1991). An alternative reading ‘of the field’ origin is presented in David Mindell’ unpublished dissertation "Datum for its own annihilation’: feedback, control, and computing, 1916-1945" (Ph.D. diss,, MIT, 1996)later pursued his graduate studies in the Biology Department of Harvard University and completed a Ph.D. under Warren McCulloch. He later co-authored the important paper "What the frog's eye tells the frog’s brain?" in 1959 along with McCulloch, Jerome Lettvin, and Walter Pitts, all of whom were important figures in the cybemetics field,'® After the completion of his Ph.D., Maturana returned to Chile and assumed a position in the biology department of the University of Chile, the most respected public university in the country. Here, he continued his ‘work on the optic nerve, but more broadly trying to uncover the organizational structure of living organisms. The title of his first book De Maquinas y Seres Vivos (translated as "On Machines and Living Beings"), illustrates a continued commitment to cybernetic ideas following his return to Chile.” However, Maturana’s contribution to Chilean cybemetics during the 1960s did not extend beyond the laboratory. When Allende came to power in 1970, Marurana reportedly made a conscious decision to remove himself and his work from Chilean politics as a means of insulating his laboratory and his students from the ramifications of political strife. On occasion, Maturana would later advise Beer on the theoretical model behind the Cybersyn system—having traveled in the same circles, the two men knew one another before Allende came to power and had developed a mutual admiration—but he always did so in an unofficial capacity.'* Although ‘Maturana provided the first bridge allowing cybemetic ideas to filter into Chile, he did not contribute to the Chilean government's familiarity and acceptance of cybemetics during Allende's presidency. Beer himself would unwittingly provide this connection. ‘5 Armuro Rosenblueth, Norbert Wiener, and Julian Bigelow, "Behavior, Purpose, and Teleology," Philosophy of Science, Vol. 10 (1943). ‘SJ. Y. Lettvin, H.R. Maturana, W. S. McCulloch, W. H. Pitts, "What the frog's eye tells the frog's brain?” Proceedings of the Insitute of Radio Engineers 47 (II): 1940- 1951, 1959. "HR Maturana and FJ. Varela, De Maquinas y Seres Vives: Una caracterizacién de a organizacién bioldgica, (Santiago: Editorial Universitaria, 1973). "Beer, interview.After serving for a number of years as the Director of Cybemetics and Operations Research at United Steel, the largest steel company in the UK, Beer left to assume the helm of Science in General Management (SIGMA), a French-owned consulting company that applied ‘operations research (OR) techniques to business problems. Beer recalled that he was trying to use OR "to change industry and government in the same way that the army, navy, and airforce had been changed [during WWII] by making mathematical models.""® This was quite an ambitious goal considering the numerous contributions OR techniques had made to the Allied anti-aircraft and U-boat efforts during the war. SIGMA’s reputation grew, and gradually the company began attracting an international clientele. In 1962, the director of Chile’s steel industry requested SIGMA's services. Beer refused to go himself—he had never been to South America and his heetic schedule made the Jengthy transit time seem unreasonable—but he composed a team of English and Spanish employees to travel to Chile in his place. SIGMA‘s work in the steel industry gradually expanded to include the railways and filtered outwards to other Chilean industries. Due to the large amount of work, the Chilean SIGMA team often employed students to pick up the slack. Among these was young Chilean student named Fernando Flores who studied industrial ‘engineering at the Catholic University in Santiago. A workaholic by nature, Flores devoted himself to mastering the principles of cybernetics and operations research practiced at SIGMA and became intimately familiar with Beer's work, His knowledge of operations research led to a teaching position at the Catholic University and by his 27 birthday he had become the Acting Dean of the Department of Engineering Science. Flores, however, led a dual life: on one side he was a successful academic, on the other an outspoken political activist. In 1969, a group of young intellectuals led by Flores and Oscar "Beer, interviewGarret6n broke from the Christian Democratic party and established the Movement of Popular Unitary Action (MAPU), a political party critical of the Christian Democrats and aligned with the Communists and Socialists of the Popular Unity (UP) coalition.2° The addition of the MAPU to the UP, combined with the inability of the right and the Christian Democrats to form a ‘winning coalition, resulted in Allende's narrow victory in the 1970 presidential election. As an acknowledgement of his political loyalty and technical competency, Allende appointed the then 28-year old Flores as General Technical Manager of the Corporacién de Fomento de la Producciéa (CORFO), the organization charged with nationalizing Chilean industry. Allende believed the nationalization of major industries deserved the utmost priority and later referred to the task as "the first step toward the making of structural changes." The nationalization effort would not only restore foreign-owned and privately-owned industries to the Chilean people, it would "abolish the pillars propping up that minority that has always condemned our country to underdevelopment"—a statement Allende made in reference to the industrial monopolies controlled by a handful of Chilean families.” Such displays of idealism resulted in a deep-seated conviction that he would convince those who disagreed with the validity of his ideas, both in his own party and in the opposition, through the eventual success of his program for socialist reform. Initiaily, it appeared he might succeed. Although many factions of the Chilean citizenry seemed suspicious of Allende’s proposed reforms, they still gave him the benefit of the doubt—a “honeymoon period". The government used these first few months to implement an economic Bay Kaufman's book Crisis in Allende's Chile: New Perspectives, (New York: Praeger, 1988) documents MAPU'’s roots as wel a the eventual ideological spit between Flores and Garretdn. Flores continued to support Allende's ‘Boverninent and eventually became Chile's Minister of Finance. Garretn split from MAPU and became active in the radical MIR party. Members of MIR criticized Allende's interpretation of democratic Maraism and fought for a lent social revolution. Régis Debray, Conversations with Allende: Socialism in Chile (London: NLB, 1971), 85. ® Allende “The Purpose of Our Victory: Inaugural address in the National Stadium, 5 November 1970," Chile’s Road to Socialism, Richard Gott, ed. Baltimore: Penguin Press, 1973), 59. 10policy of Keynesian “pump priming”, intended to promote economic growth through increased purchasing power and higher employment rates. ‘The growing nationalized sector of the economy became a new source of employment for Popular Unity supporters, resulting in rapid industrial expansion and heightened rates of domestic production. In a more extreme example, factories such as Cervecerfas Unidas (a Santiago brewery) more than doubled the number of their employees following nationalization in 1971.7 Government agencies followed suit and significantly increased the number of employees on their payroll as illustrated by the Municipal ‘Works Corporation (CORMU), which increased the number of its employees from 200 to 12,000 during Allende’s presidency." Land reform programs and the inception of government- sponsored assistance to rural workers augmented the purchasing power of individuals in the impoverished agrarian sector. Collectively, these acts succeeded in creating a growing segment of the population with money to spend. The government believed this redistribution of income ‘would stimulate the economy and subsequently increase demand, raise production, and eventually eliminate underemployment. During the first five months, Ailende's approach produced positive results: the GDP increased by 8.6%, unemployment declined, and demand exceeded production; this resulted in a sharp increase of foreign imports and, paradoxically, an initial drop in inflation. ‘However, as the bliss of the honeymoon period began to fade, the long-term instability of ‘Allende’s approach became apparent. The expansion of imports and increase in government spending quickly depleted the $343.4 million in foreign reserves accumplated by Allende's predecessor, President Eduardo Frei Montalva. Although Allende’s program of industrial expansion through massive hiring initially helped factories increase their output and attain fall 2 Robert Moss Chile's Marxist Experiment (London: David & Charles, 1973), pp. 77-78 + The Economist, October 13, 1973, 44.productive capacity, eventually the number of employees exceeded the amount of work available, leaving many workers idle, The re-emergence of underemployment contributed to an increase of strike activity among workers that the government later encouraged as a means of facilitating their nationalization efforts. Moreover, the government's willingness to negotiate with striking factions inadvertently encouraged other groups of dissatisfied workers to adopt similar approaches of interrupting production.* Between the years 1969 and 1972, the number of strikes per year more than tripled.” Inflation began to skyrocket, spurred by increases in government deficit spending. By July 1971 it reached 45.9% and continued to rise to a devastating 163.4% by the end of 1972." ‘The drop in the international price for copper, Chile's primary export, and the repeated cutbacks in international aid further crippled Chile’s attempts at economic recovery and put them on a downward path toward economic catastrophe. ‘Attempts at nationalizing the industrial sector also proved problematic, Foreign investors in Chilean copper mines and telecommunications companies (ITT) opposed nationalization and insisted upon receiving sufficient compensation for acts of government appropriation.” Opposing political factions accused the government of abusing legislative loopholes in order to acquire desirable industries. For example, a decree passed in 1932 gave the executive branch the right to appropriate a plant if it could not maintain production. According to the opposition, the government would invoke this law, originally intended to prevent layoffs and plant closings during the Great Depression, after encouraging workers aligned with the Left to go on strike, interrupt production, and consequently permit nationalization, The controversy surrounding Fnflation dropped from 34.9% in 1970 to 22.1% in 1971. Arturo Valenzucls The Breakdown of Democratic Regimes: Chile (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1978), 52. ibid. 62 P ibid. 61 ibid. 35 2‘Allende’s nationalization policy continued to escalate, presenting a point of substantial political tension within Congress and prompting two Christian Democratic Senators to draft a constitutional amendment probil 1g nationalization in the “mixed” sector without legislative approval. ‘Moreover, the rapid growth of the nationalized sector created an uncontrollable monster. By the end of 1972, approximately 25% of industrial production had fallen under the control of the state, The combined increase in the number of industries under state control and the number cof employees within each industry presented the government with the difficult task of managing a sector of the economy that became harder to monitor with each passing day. In.an attempt to bring this cumbersome sector under control, the government sent "interventors" to replace previous management and govern activities within these newly nationalized industries."' These representatives, however, created new problems. Although some were competent and dedicated to their jobs, others were corrupt and severely unqualified for the positions, a situation exacerbated by the need to distribute appointments equally among the political parties regardless of the level of competency found in their respective talent pools. Even parties within the Popular Unity coalition criticized Allende’s use of the interventors. For example, the Communist Party argued they merely served as replacements for the managers who had preceded them, occupying, the same homes and driving the same cars. In their eyes, not only did these representatives fail to provide an adequate means of bringing production under the control of the people, but they also helped veil the reality of a perpetuating status quo. Daily operations within the factories further suffered from the political strife caused by these representatives. At times, workers % Nathaniel Davis The Last Two Years of Salvador Altende (Uhaea: Cornell University Press, 1985), 23-26, 67-71 ibid. 59. * Allende’s administration used the word “interventor” to refer to the politically appointed officials who replaced the previous factory managers and literally intervened in factory production practices by bringing each newly nationalized factory under the control of state. 2Bsimply refused to listen to managers hailing from political parties different than their own; this in turn necessitated a frustrating process of party mectings and negotiations.* Although the symptoms of Chile's economic crisis assumed many forms, Valenzuela’s retrospective observation that the "economic crisis during the Allende period clearly became the government's chief unsolvable problem” succinctly characterizes the magnitude of Chile's economic decline. However, at the time the government viewed the economic situation as far from “unsolvable”. On July 13 1971, Beer received a letter from Flores stating that he was familiar with Beer's work and was "now in a position from which it is possible to implement on a national scale—at which cybernetic thinking becomes a necessity—scientific views on management and organization." He asked for Beer's advice on applying cybernetic principles to the regulation of the nationalized sector. Beer's response was enthusiastic: 1 simply must ask you whether I could play some part, although I do not know what to suggest... Believe me, I would surrender any of my retainer contracts I now have for the charee of working on this. That is because I believe your country is really going to do ‘One month later, Flores flew to England to mect with the man whose work he studied during his years working for SIGMA. The two met at the Athenaeum Club in London, a gentlemen's club for the British intelligentsia where Beer had a membership. Flores did not speak much English and Beer did not speak any Spanish, but the two men managed to communicate in a mixture of French, English, and Latin. Flores informed Beer that he had assembled a government team consisting of his former students, friends, and colleagues and asked the cybernetician to travel to 2 Valenzuela 62 » ibid. 61 * Letter from Fernando Flores to Stafford Becr, July 13, 1971, box 55, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. Teter from Sufford Boer to Fomnando Fores, July 29, 1771, box 55, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. 4Chile and direct their efforts applying cybernetic principles to the nationalization effort. In November 1971, Beer arrived in Santiago. Constructing Cybersyn ‘Beer landed in Chile on the same day Allende celebrated the one-year anniversary of his election. Before a packed audience at the National Stadium, the President informed the crowd that now “more than ever one has to be aware of what Chilean life is and of the path that is authentically ours, which is the path of pluralism, democracy, and freedom, the path that opens the doors of socialism." It was a speech of celebration, promise, and national pride that clectrified the nation. Flores’ handpicked Chilean team included several engineers, an English professor, a statistician, a mathematician, and a translator—ten team members in all. During his ten-day visit, Beer met various influential people in the Chilean government, including the Minister of Economics. Meanwhile, each member of his team read the manuscript version of Beer's book Brain of the Firm and made the language of Beer's management cybemetics their "lingua franca".2’ The book outlined Beer's viable system model—a system Beer believed could maintain stability in biological, mechanical, social, and political organizations. Cybersyn's design cannot be understood without a basic grasp of Beer's viable system model; thus it ‘warrants a brief description. ‘Although the viable system model first appeared in Brain of the Firm (1972), it still stands as one of the guiding concepts behind Beer's work. It is defined as “a system that survives. It coheres; it is integral...but it has none the less mechanisms and opportunities to * Salvador Allende, "First Anniversary of the Popular Government, National Stadium, Santiago, November 4, 1971,"The Salvador Allende Reader, James D. Cockcroft, ed. (New York: Ocean Press, 2000), 123-124, > Brain 249. 15grow and lea, to evolve and to adapt” The value of the system "variables" (inputs) determined the system's resultant "state"; Beer referred to the number of possible states as the system's "variety", a direct reference to Ross Ashby's famous "Law of Requisite Variety". A. system able to maintain all ccitical variables within the limits of systemic equilibrium achieved “homeostasis", a quality desired by all viable systems. Often, the stability of the system depended on limiting the system's variety—an intuitive observation once one considers the Herculean task of regulating a system with an infinite number of potential states. From these principles, Beer constructed a five-tier model for viable systems, which he based on the human neurosystem. In spite of the model's biological origins, Beer maintained the abstraction of the structure could be applied in numerous contexts, including the firm, the body, and the state. Figure 1 illustrates the biological rendering of Beer's five-tier system, but in its most basic form the viable system model resembles a flow chart. In his writings, Boer switches freely among metaphors drawn from machines, organizations, and organisms when describing each of the system's five levels. For clarity, only an explanation of the biological mode! will be presented here. ‘System One, the sensory level, functions as a bodily organ (such as the lungs or the kidneys), behaves in an “essentially autonomous” manner, and is restricted only by the bounds needed to ensure the stability of the entire organism. System Two acts as a cybemetic spinal cord; it collects data from the various organs and presents it in a manner useful to either the other members of System One or those in System Three. "Each organ of the body," writes Beer, Ten pints of Boer: The rationale of Stafford Beer's cybernetic books (1959.94), Discussion with Stafford Beer,” Kybernetes 29, no. 516 (2000): 558-569. The Brain of the Firm 239, This statement illustrates a occurring characteristic of Beer's work, namely the ihesis of metaphors drawn from biological and machinery characteristic of work in the ficld of cybernetics. "This law holds that che variety in the control system must match the variety inthe system to be controlled. See W. Ross Ashby, An Introduction to Cybernetics (London: Chapinan and Hall, 1956). 16“would be isolated on its lateral axis if it were not for the arrangement of each organ’s own, ws controller into a cohesive set of such controllers—which we have called System Two.’ Figure 1: The biological representation of Beer's viable system model. Source: Brain of the Firm. ‘System Three resembles a combination of the pons, medulla, and cerebellum in the brain. It monitors the behavior of each organ, as well as their collective interaction, and emits a warming signal should trouble arise. Furthermore, System Three filters the wealth of information collected by the lower systems and directs only the important information upwards to System Brain 129. ”Four. As “the biggest switch”, System Four provides the vital kink between volitional and automatic control or, in the case of the Cybersyn system, centralized or decentralized regulation. Itallows the lower levels to behave autonomously, but permits System Five to pointedly intervene in their activities should the need arise. ‘The final level of the model, System Five, ‘occupies the “chief executive” position, which Beer likens to the cerebral cortex. Although System Five receives input from System Four and sits at the top of the hierarchy, it must behave as a "“multi-node", acting as both boss and colleague to each of the other levels. According to Beer, this redundant system of interconnectedness increases viability by eliminating errors made elsewhere in the process and thereby minimizing the deleterious effects of centralization. In Beer's mind, this five-tier system not only provided the characteristic skeleton for all viable systems; it also existed recursively in each of the five levels. Beer writes: “the whole is always encapsulated in each part...this is a lesson leamed from biology where we find the genetic blue-print of the whole organism in every cell.“ The state, the firm, and the worker, and the cell all exhibited the same series of structural relationships. Applying his organizational vision to Chile, Beer wrote, “Recursively speaking, the Chilean nation is embedded in the world of nations, and the government is embedded in the nation. all these are supposedly viable systems.” Once armed with Beer's model for cybemetic control, the team examined their available computing resources. By 1968, three U.S. companies—NCR, Burroughs, and IBM—had installed fewer than 50 computers in Chile, the largest being an IBM 360/40 mainframe. ‘Comparatively, Chile's computing power ranked behind that found in Brazil, Argentina, 2 ibid. 136. * ibid, 249. “4 Aaron Fineeman, “Computing Capabilities at Argentine and Chilean Universities," Communications of the ACM, 12, n0.8, (August 1969): 427,Colombia, and Venezuela.> The previous Christian Democratic government had encouraged USS. investment and business with American companies, but high import duties combined with the already high price tag made computer technology a less attractive option to Chilean industries than to their American counterparts. Recognizing this, the National Enterprise for ‘Computers and Informatics (ECOM), a government agency established in the 1960s to oversee the purchase of Chilean computing technology and assure its proper use, allowed universities to waive the import duty. Yet, this only solved part of the problem. Once a university had purchased a computer ECOM would deny subsequent requests to upgrade, which frequently resulted in a wait of several years to secure a printer or additional disk. Allende’s election in 1970 severely impacted Chile’s already limited supply of computer resources, The U.S. response to Allende’s presidency was nothing short of hostile.“ Motivated by Cold War anxieties, the U.S. government began to cut off financial support to the Popular Unity. Moreover, U.S. officials used their leverage to encourage the World Bank and the Inter- American Development bank to adopt similar policies. The Agency for Intemational Development and the U.S. Export-Import Bank both denied Chile's request for credit in 1971 and 1972, as did many smaller private banks whose credit facilitated international transactions.” Denied of American credit, the Chilean government found itself forced to pay cash for U.S. manufactured goods—a situation that became increasingly difficult as Chile sank deeper into debt and copper revenues continued to decline. The government could not afford to purchase additional computer power. As of 1971, the Chilean government owned four mainframe computers, but could only allocate time on one machine to the Cybersyn project—a severe “ Barry Bochm, "Computing in South America," Daramation, 16, n0.5 (May 1970): 98. * 4 good description of U.S/Chilean relations is contained in Davis. * Valenzuela 56, Loveman 347. rtlimitation to the desired decentralized design.® The project leaders originally secured time on the top-performing IBM 360/50, but later transferred the project to the less heavily used Burroughs 3500 mainframe when processing delays on the 360/50 exceeded 48 hours.” ‘The teum then searched for a way to connect cach factory in the nationalized sector to the central mainframe in Santiago. Eventually, they settled on an existing telex network, previously used to track satellites. Unlike the heterogeneous networked computer systems in use today, telex networks mandate the use of specific terminals and can only transmit ASCIL characters. Microwave channels linked each terminal to the network. Having identified the existing hardware options, the team worked frantically to design a feasible schematic for the entire system. The eventual design consisted of four sub-projects: Cybernet, Cyberstride, Checo, and Opstoom. Work on each of these projects would span from 1971-1973, during which time Beer would make 11 trips to Chile, each trip approximately two weeks in duration.®” Several months into the project, the team apptied the name "Cybersyn" to describe the entire scope of the system. A synthesis of "cybemetics” and "synergy", the project name firmly illustrated the team’s belief that the whole system exceeded the sum of its parts. ‘The first component of the system, the Cybernet project, would create a national network of communication across the 3000 miles of Chilean coastline and would extend the existing telex network to each firm in the nationalized sector, enabling them to transmit data on a regular basis toa central computer in Santiago. At the outset, Cybersyn project developers claimed they ‘would achieve real-time communication capabilities, however in the actual design of the system “ ECOM owned three IBM mainframes (wo 360/40 models and one 360/50) and one Burroughs 3500 mainfiame. ‘Notes on available ECOM computing resources, November 11, 1971, box 55, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpocl, England. ® A forty-eight hour delay on the [BM machine prohibited real-time analysis (the stated purpose of the system's construction) and caused much frustration among the Cybersyn team. * Beer, interview. 20each firm could only transmit data once per day." This centralized design ran counter to Beer's conceptualization of the project, but coincided with Allende’s statement: "We are and always shall be in favour of a centralized economy, and companies will have to conform to the ‘Government's planning."*” Cyberstride, the second component of the Cybersyn system, encompassed the suite of ‘computer programs written to collect, process, and distribute data to and from cach of the firms. Members of the Cyberstride team created "quantitative flow charts of activities within each factory that would highlight all important activities," including a parameter for “social unease,” measured by the proportion of employees present on a given day of work in comparison the umber of employees on the factory payroll.” Cyberstride performed statistical filtration on the “pure numbers" output from these factory models, discarding the data that fell within the acceptable system parameters and directing the information deemed important up to the next. level of management. When a factory index fell outside the range specified by Cyberstride, the system emitted a waming, known as an “algedonic signal” in Beer's cybernetic vocabulary. Initially, only the director of the factory would receive the algedonic waming. However, if the factory neglected to correct the failing parameter within a specified period of time, the computer ‘would send a signal to the management team in the Opsroom. Beer argued this system of ‘operation granted factories almost complete control over the activities within their walls, while still permitting outside intervention in the case of more serious problems. This, Beer belicved, provided an ideal balance between centralized and decentralized control. 5 tn reality, Chiles limited computer resources created data processing time lags of 48-72 hourt—a source of considerable frustration among members ofthe Cybersyn team. ‘This eventualy forced the team :o switch the project from an IBM 340/50 mainframe owned by ECOM to a Burroughs mainframe owned by one ofthe area universities. 2 Debray 111 ® Brain 253. a4Cyberstride represented a joint effort between a team of Chilean engincers, headed by Isaguino Benadorf, one of Chile's leading technical experts, and a team of British consultants at ‘Asthur Andersen in London. The British team, led by Alan Dunsmuir, designed and coded a temporary suite of programs, which they gave to the Chilean team in March 1972 for final revisions. Meanwhile, representatives from the Chilean Cyberstride team visited plants throughout the country, met with workers and managers, and created flowchart models of factory production. They also determined the appropriate amount of recovery time allotted to a firm before allowing an algedonic signal to percolate up the system hicrarchy, a process Beer referred to.as “designing freedom.” Checo (CHilean ECOnomy), the third part of the Cybersyn project, constituted an ambitious effort to model the Chilean economy and provide simulations of future economic behavior. Appropriately, it was sometimes referred to as “Futuro”. ‘The simulator would serve as the “government's experimental laboratory"—an instrumental equivalent to Allende's frequent likening of Chile to "social laboratory”. ‘The bulk of the work on Checo occurred in England, under the direction of electrical engineer and operations research scientist Ron Anderton. The simulation program used Jay Forrester's DYNAMO compiler, one of Anderton's areas of, expertise. However, the Chilean team, headed by a chemical engineer Mario Grandi, kept close tabs on Anderton's model, laboriously checking his calculations and asking detailed questions about the model and the computer tools used in its implementation. Although Grandi sent Héman Avilés, a Chilean systems analyst, to study with Anderton, the lack of direct Chilean involvement in the modeling project caused some concern, Eventually, one member of the Chilean team asked Beer for manuals to the DYNAMO compiler so they could develop their Stafford Beer, Designing Freedom (New York: Iohn Wiley & Sons, 1974), 2"own simulation language for the Chilean economic characteristics.”** The CHECO team initially used national statistics to test the accuracy of the simulation program. When these results failed, Beer and his fellow team members faulted the time differential in the generation of statistical inputs, an observation that re-emphasized the perceived necessity for real-time data. ‘The simulation project continued with inputs generated from Cyberstride, having never produced quantitative proof that it accurately modeled the Chilean economy. Eventually, CHECO lost support among members of the Chilean government and was placed on a back burner behind the development of Figure 2: The original Cybersyn Opsroom constructed in | the Operations Room. Santiago and designed by Gui Bonseipe. Notice the buttons on the armrests designed to eliminate typing and a version of Beer's ‘The final of the four ‘viable system model projected on the rear wall. Source: Plasform for Change. components, Opsroom, created a new environment for decision making, one modeled after a British WWI war room (Figure 2). It consisted of seven chairs arranged in an inward facing circle flanked by a series of projection screens, each displaying the data collected from the factories. In the Opsroom, all industries were homogenized by a uniform system of iconic representation, meant to facilitate the maximum extraction of information by an individual with a minimal amount of scientific * Telex from Ratil Espejo to Stafford Beer, April 14, 1972, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. 58 The idea of war occurs frequently throughout the project notes, and certainly more can be said about this relationship than the scope of this paper can allow. Beer invoked the war room analogy as a means of conveying the 23Project Cybersyn Decision Making ‘Minister of Economics Central computer: computes indices, relays fq algedonic. signals Level 3 Telex network Level? ma a I Here, data is generated | ___p] from factory Level 1 Outside Bavironment Figore 3: Overview of Project Cybersyn according to Beer's fiveevel hierarchy. This diagram hs ‘been created by the author as ¢ compilation of diagrams presented in two of Beer's reports, Cybernetic Notes on the Effective Organization of the Siate and Project Cybersiride both dated November 1971 taining. Beer recognized that the men sitting in the chairs would not possess skill as typists—an ‘occupation typically performed by female secretaries. Therefote, en lieu of the traditional keyboard, the Opsroom team designed a series of large “big-hand” buttons as the input mechanism. Beer felt this technological decision eliminated “the girl between themselves and ‘importance of visual displays of information in rapid decision-making, but also as a means of reminding participants 24the machinery” and would bring the user closer to the machine.” The room was constructed in Santiago throughout 1972 using projection equipment primarily imported from England. The correlation between the Cybersyn architecture and Beer’s five-tier viable system is, presented in Figure 3. Selected factory parameters generate the System One sensory data, which travels along the telex network (System Two) to the central computer in Santiago (System ‘Three). The computer monitors the performance of each factory and checks for anomalies. If an anomaly occurs and fails to return to normal within a satisfactory time frame, the computer then sends a warning to the Opsroom (System Fout) that System Five needs intervene in the affairs of ‘System One. CHECO also operates at the level of System Four and provides additional assistance to System Five in their decision-making. ‘The existing telex infrastructure contributed significantly to the early functionality of the Cybernet network, the first Cybersyn component to become operational. ‘The Cyberstride suite ‘generated its first printout on March 21, 1972, at which time Beer sent an enthusiastic telex to Anderton: "Cyberstride suite really works.... The whole thing was impossible and we did it.""* Due to problems in locating a suitable space for construction and delays in receiving equipment from the British company Electrosonic, the Opsroom prototype did not reach completion until January 1973.” However, the system proved instrumental to the Popular Unity even in its unfinished form. The new infrastructure for communication provided by Cybernet proved vital to the that they were fighting an economic war where time was ofthe essence. * Stafford Beer. Platform for Change, (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1975), 449. * Telex from Stafford Beer to Ron Anderton, March 21, 1972, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. » Letter from Stafford Beer to Robert Simpson of Blectrosonic, October 1, 1972, box 62, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. 25government during the opposition-led gremio strike of October 1972. In response to the strike, Flores, now Undersecretary of Economics, created an emergency operations center next to the central telex hub and tasked eight members of the Cybersyn team with monitoring the two thousand telexes sent per day! The rapid flow of messages over the telex lines enabled the government to react quickly to the strike activity and mobilize resources in a way that minimized the damage caused by the gremialistas. The successful management of the gremio strike established Flores as both technical expert and vital contributor to the survival of the Popular Unity. It also publicly demonstrated Cybersyn's utility to the government, Several weeks after the strike’s conclusion, Cybersyn technical manager Hermann Schwember remarked, "The ‘growth of our actual influence and power has exceeded our best imagination." Allende would continue to support Cybersyn's construction throughout his presidency. On September 8, 1973, he sent a communication to the Cybersyn team asking that the Operations Room be moved to the presidential palace in La Moneda—a mere four days before the military coup that would end his dream and take his life. "Revolutionary" Computing Flores's success with the gremio strike put him in a unique position as the newly appointed Undersecretary of Economics. Relatively unknown to the opposition, Flores believed he had a chance of increasing his support by “building a different personal image” based upon "a © The Gremialsta movement protested government nationalization effors, and gained considerable momentum after a forty thousand member independent trucker association tried to prevent the creation ofa stat-owned trucking. association. The gremio strike attempted to shut down the Chilean economy by mobilizing shopkeepers, professional and cconomic associations, bank clerks, truck drivers, and even several student and eampesino ‘reanizations. Loveman 341, * Brain 313, © Latier from Hermann Schwember to Stafford Becr, November 6, 1972, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England,certain myth around [his] scientific qualifications." He soon abandoned this idea after his previously valued technical skills incited charges of technocracy, Instead of building a coalition with the members of the opposition, Flores found himself attacked by members of his own party and, as a result, he began to distance himself from the project. In February 1973, Beer remarked that their relationship, which "was going great when [Flores] became Undersecretary had “almost wholly collapsed." This incident illustrates the degree of influence Chile’s political context exerted on Cybersyn’s development. Although Allende had secured the presidency through a leftist. coalition, in reality the Popular Unity was far from unified. Mounting criticisms from the right soon joined those from the Communist Party and more radical factions in the Socialist Party, all of whom attacked Allende’s policies with increasing vehemence. As Chile's political parties continued to splinter into disjointed, but vocal minorities armed with an agenda, compromise seemed impossible.” This highly fractured political climate not only guided the actions of Cybersyn team members, it also necessitated concerted efforts to secure a base of political ‘support to ensure Cybersyn's progress. Beer recognized the utility of combining Marxist rhetoric with that of modernization to create a "powerful political instrument" able to gamer outside support. He often used phrases such as “the people's science” to stress the anti-technocratic nature of the Cybersyn project. In his public speeches, Beer emphasized that Chile's best scientists were creating "a new system of © Lower from Hermann Schwember to Stafford Boor, November 12, 1972, box 64, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. Leiter from Stafford Beer to Hermann Schwember, February 21, 1973, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. Valenzuela 63-70. © Safford Beer, “The Extension of Cybernetic Management Systems tothe Enterprises: A reconsideration ofthe political context”, October 14, 1972, box 57, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. 27The politics surrounding the project extended beyond its public presentation or the desired qualifications of Cybersyn team members. it shaped the very design of the system. Understanding the correlation between Cybersyn’s design and Allende's politics requires a closer examination of the President's plan to transform Chile into a socialist state. Cybernetic Socialism Allende's interpretation of Marx's writings emphasized the importance of respecting Chile’s existing democratic processes in bringing about socialist reform, a possibility alluded to ‘by Marx but never realized.” Unlike previous socialist revolutions, such as those. in Cuba and in the Soviet Union, Chile's transition to socialism incorporated many facets of democracy, including respect for election results, individual freedoms (such as the freedom of thought, speech, press, assembly, and rule of law), and public participation in government decision- making through elected representatives.”' At one point, Allende promised to augment existing freedoms stating, "we would not be revolutionaries if we were to limit ourselves to maintaining political freedom. The government of the Unidad Popular will extend political freedom.” However, itis crucial to note that Allende's notion of individual or political freedoms did not coincide with individualism, which he associated with self-interest and therefore detracted from the collective well being of the Chilean nation.” In contrast to the centralized planning found in communist Russia, Ailende’s articulation of socialism stressed a commitment to decentralized governance, reinforcing his professed belief in individual freedoms. Yet, his socialist convictions often put him at odds with this position; he admitted that in the face of political ” Karl Marx, “The Possibility of Non-Violent Revolution” in The Marx-Engels Reader, Robert C. Tucker, ed. (New 3 Timor shes Alene si “The oad socalism Ks tough demcr, plain, ad fiedom Salvador Allende “The Purpose of Our Victory, Inaugural address at the National Stadium, November 5, 1970", Chile's Road to Socialism, (Baltimore: Penguin Books, Ltd., 1973), 61. ® Allende, "The Chilean Road to Socialism: First annual message to Congress, May 21,1971", 149. ” Debray 87. 29plurality the government would favor the "interest of those who made their living by their own work." ‘The tension inherent in Beer’s model between individual autonomy and the welfare of the collective organism mirrors the struggle between competing ideologies found in Allende’s democratic socialism. Both emphasize the importance of individual freedoms and the need for decentralization, while recognizing situations when "the needs of one division must be sacrificed. . explicitly to the needs of other divisions." Thus, the collective welfare of the state or the homeostasis of the system supercedes the mechanisms devised to ensure autonomy, freedom, and liberty. According to Beer, this conflict of values can only be resolved at the top, a belief supported by Allende's admission that the Chilean government will favor policies protecting the rights and interests of the workers in spite of the legislative provisions that grant ‘equal rights to the opposition. However, the similarity between Allende’s articulation of socialism and the cybemetic model guiding Cybersyn’s construction, however striking, should not come as a complete surprise. Cybersyn was intentionally designed to provide an instrumental embodiment of Chile's socialist politics. Schwember wrote, “The feasibility of any conceivable scheme of participation is strongly dependent on prevailing ideology." Marxism not only guided the design of the system, it provided the essential hegemonic force needed for Cybersyn’s continued functionality. ‘System diagrams reveal the Marxist slant in Cybersyn's design, as shown by the two diagrams in Figure 4 depicting the relationship of the worker to the overall viable system model. In the first image, the worker appears at the heart of all viable systems—a clear demonstration of 7% othe Chilean Road to Socialism’ 150. * ibid. 161. "© Hermann Schwember, "Cybernetics in Government: Experience with new Tools for Management in Chile 1971- 1973," Concepts and Tools of Computer-assisted Policy Analysis, Vol. 1, Hartnut Bossel, ed. (Basel und Stutgart: Birkhituser, 197), 136. 30| ialeiadeebatetatoneta | Figure 4: These diagrams illustrate the primacy of the worker in the design of Cybersyn system, a direct reflection of Allende’s political ideology. The top figure placed the worker atthe center of all viable systems. The lower figure demonstrates that workers contribute both physically and mentally to the success of Chilean industry. Source: Cybernetics in Goverment. Regulating the revolution Beer and Allende both sought to change the Chilean system of governance. For Allende, transforming Chile from a capitalist to a socialist nation necessitated structural transformation and a systematic dismantling of previous production practices. Beer's work similarly aimed to 32Two Levis or Becuesion Figure 5: The new viable system drawn by Beer in December 1972, The figure illustrates that Cybersyn now belongs on a lower level of recursion and acts as another System One input to Beer's overall vision for transforming the Chilean economy. Source: One Year of (Relative) Solitude. ‘provide tools for transforming Chile’s system of factory control by restructuring the industrial sector to adhere to his five-tier model, eliminating what he perceived as unnecessary ‘bureaucracy, and granting factory workers a new means of participating in factory regulation. In 3Bone of his earlier reports dated October 1972, Beer wrote, “The target is to transform the whole of industrial management, and to make Chilean industry fully effective in one year.”*! However, the project quickly transcended its initial goal of factory regulation and expanded to address numerous facets of the Chilean political system, including a project to install algedonic meters in Chilean homes, allowing government officials to monitor public reactions to political speeches. Beer dubbed this undertaking "The People's Project" because he believed the meters would enable the government to respond rapidly to public demands, rather than oppress opposing views.*? Barely one month later Beer wrote to the Chilean project leader Ratil Espejo, “We are only beginning the reformation of the whole process of government. Ido not exaggerate to say that the total concept is of two orders of magnitude bigger than cybersynergy.”* By December 1972, three months after the gremio strike, Beer had compietely revised the scope of the project, drawing two levels of recursion rather than the single viable system that initially characterized Cybersyn (Figure 5). The original technical project was now eclipsed by a new overarching project of state regulation; in this schematic Cybersyn provided ‘one input rather than a systematic whole. Although Beer's ambitious ideas continued to command the respect of his fellow Chilean teammates—they often referred to him as a genius—he frequently met resistance from those who claimed they were “politically unrealistic”. This complaint resurfaced among members of his team, some of whom preferred constructing technical solutions rather than redefining, government operations. In response to one of Beer's later reports, Espejo wrote: Within the government in the short term, I think the ideological problems are in a *) Stafford Beer, “The Extension of Cybernetic Management Systems to the Enterprises: A reconsideration of the pplitical context”, 3. ‘Stafford Beer, "Project Cyberfolk,” March 1972, box 61, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores ‘University, Liverpool, England. © Telex from Stafford Boer to Raiil Espejo, November 6, 1972, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool Joha Moores University, Liverpool, England. 34second place...we can do models for effective problems of the economy... Through them we can dismantle the bureaucracy. Throughout 1973, Beer grew increasingly frustrated with Espejo’s technocratic leanings; this passage acutely illustrates Espejo's affinity for technical problems rather than ideological ones. From 1971 to 1973, the Cybersyn team expanded their project goal from one of economic regulation to one of political structural transformation. However, the success of the project, depended upon members of the industrial sector and the Chilean government accepting the system in its entirety. As Beer himself acknowledged, adopting individual components could prove disastrous and result in “an old system of government with some new tools... For if the invention is dismantled, and the tools used are not the tools we made, they could become instruments of oppression.”** This being said, onlookers from within Chile and around the world tended to view Cybersyn ‘as an accumulation of its technological components rather than a synergistic whole—in effect separating the technology from the ideology behind its creation. Members of Chilean opposition parties wrote congratulatory letters to Beer Figure 6: Cover image from the British publication Science for People depicting the Cybersyn system as abusive to the Chilean workers. ‘embracing the Cybersyn’s design, minus, of course, its emphasis on worker participation. © Letter from Ratil Espejo to Stafford Beer, May 22, 1973, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. ® Swafford Becr, “On Decybernation: a contribution to current debates”, April 27, 1973, box 64, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England. 38‘The popular Chilean news magazine Ercilla also separated the project from its socialist objectives and published an article in January 1973 entitled “Mr. Beer’s Big Brother”—an obvious allusion to the totalitarian world depicted in George Orwell's 1984.* Internationally, the separation of the technology from the ideology provoked criticism from British publications New Scientist and Science for People, both of which accused the system of being overly centralized and abusive to the Chilean population.” Similar criticism came from the US, particularly from Herb Grosch of the National Bureau of Standards who refused to believe that "Beer and his team could put together a major new model, in a strange and primitive hardware and software environment, in a few months.” Grosch continued, "Icall the ‘whole concept beastly. It is a good thing for humanity, and for Chile in particular, that it is only abad dream."* Throughout 1973, Beer received invitations from the governments of Brazil, South Africa, and Ireland to build comparable systems. Considering the political context of each of these nations during the early 1970s, it is easy to sympathize with Beer's lament, “You can see ‘what a false position I am in.” According to Beer, the success of the system hinged on its acceptance as a system, a network of people as well as machines, a revolution in behavior as well as in instrumental capability. However, in practice quite the opposite occurred. Not only were the tools not accepted in the manner they were designed, but members of the Cybersyn team failed to fully understand the principles behind their development, nor could they successfully convey the tationale behind the system to members of the industrial sector. One of the members of the Chilean team poignantly summarized the situation: *° “£1 “hermano mayor’ de Mr. Beer,” Ercilla, no. 1958 (23-30 January 1973): 11. ® John Adams “Everything Under Control,” Science for People, no. 21 (April-May 1973): 4-6. Joseph Hanon, “Chile leaps into cybernetic future,” New Scientist, 57, no. 833 (February 15, 1973):363-364. ® Herb Grosch, "Chilean Economie Controls.” New Scientia, 57, no. 837 (March 15, 1973): 626-627.«the final objective, ‘the revolution in management’ is not accepted, nor even understood.... [haven't seen a single manager really motivated by the central concept, and what is worse...{of] the team that has developed the work only a very few present the concepts involved... Ultimately your work is accepted as long as it provides tools to achieve a more effective traditional management. It is not even a halfway revolution, it is a mixture, which if not adequately cared for might end up meaning a new increase in bureaucracy.” Although Cybersyn engineers received explicit instructions to work in conjunetion with worker committees in developing quantifiable models detailing factory production capabilities, often the converse occurred and the engineer would treat the worker with an air of condescension rather than cooperation." This attitude not only led to resistance on the part of the workers; it evoked outright hostility and charges of technocracy, Unlike the other indices in Beer's regulatory model, labor did not behave as another factor of production and their resistance to the Cybersyn models illustrated their power as a corpus of self-conscious individuals able to criticize and resist state operations. Instead of inciting social transformation and augmenting worker participation at every level of government, a principle the Cybersyn team took pains to uphold on paper, these interactions between Cybersyn engineers and workers in the nationalized sector reinforced the project's technocratic image. The new role created for the scientific expert was later summarized ‘in a paper written by a member of the project team. According to the author, “The individual [workers] should have effective and organic feedback channels to all niveaus of the system”, but atthe same time learn to accept expert advice and even demand it when necessary. This would hetp them “avoid confusion of their role."®* The design of the Opstoom further confirmed that ‘ Telex ftom Stafford Beer to Rail Espejo, March 1, 1973, box 66, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John ‘Moores University, Liverpool, England. *° Leter from Tomas Kohn to Stafford Beer, April 19, 1973, box 63, The Stafford Beer Collection, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, England, 2 Brain of the Firm 271. * Schweanber 88. Ttis interesting to note that Beer diverged with this view as the project progressed and eventually drafted both a report and a letter to President Allende emphasizing the importance of the workers learning to create ‘the models themselves rather than looking to the advice of technocratic exper. 37Cybersyn regulated existing social relations instead of transforming them. By deciding to remove the keyboard and “eliminate the girl" between the user and the machine, the Cybersyn team demonstrated both an understanding and an acceptance that state power would remain in the hands of Chile's male population, This design choice similarly illustrates that "worker" would continue to refer exclusively to those employed in factories and not expand to include those ‘performing clerical tasks. Jn Beer's model, maintaining the integrity of a system's structure proved vital to viability—successful regulation lead to homeostasis, transformation meant death.” This premise created two immediate problems. First, making Beer’s model a functional reality necessitated transforming the existing Chilean structure of political, economic, and social relations, a near impossible task in Chile's fractured political context. Revolution through democracy, rather than through violence, restricted the potential avenues for change and after much frustration caused Beer to wonder, “Does it take more courage to be a cybemetician than to be a gunman?” Second, the earlier assertion that Cybersyn would bring about socialist transformation now seems quite paradoxical: how can a system bring about structural change if it depends on the structure already being in place? Although members of the project team designed the factory models with a degree of structural flexibility at the industry level, Cybersyn as a whole did not possess the capabilities needed to transition Chile’s economy from a capitalist to a socialist, system. Rather than regulate transformation, Cybersyn fell victim to the onslaught of instability accompanying Allende’s program for socialist reform. Project engineers similarly found themselves attempting the impossible: modeling an economic system that refused to remain constant using only a subset of the variables needed to understand the system. Production, as, "This principle seme from Humberto Maturana’s principle of autopoesis—the concept that ll structures, mechanical and biological, need (o be able to reproduce themselves in order to survive. * On Deeybernation” 6. 38‘gauged by flows of raw materials and finished goods, constituted only one aspect of the Chilean economy-—one that increasingly paled in comparison to the economic effects caused by political infighting, U.S. policy, and increased social unrest. In hindsight Beer wrote, “The model we ‘were using....could not adequately represent changes that had come about during Allende's term. ..because these were changes in economic management that had nothing to do with ‘ownership in the legal sense."* Rather than transforming Chile’s economy through the massive social restructuring Beer envisioned, Cybersyn struggled merely to regulate the status quo. ‘However, this should not imply that the system was complete failure, just as the ideological coherence between the system and Allende’s plan for reform does not qualify it as a success. Regulation, like transformation, played an important role in keeping the Allende government afloat and, as Chile's socio-economic situation slid into chaos, the necessity for social and political regulation gradually eclipsed the earlier priority attributed to structural transformation. Although Beer maintained the system would only function properly in its ‘entirety, components from the prototype contributed significantly to the government's ability to counteract and manage strike activity. This regulative contribution alone is significant—if left untended the gremio strike could have shortened the life span of the Popular Unity, or further restricted their opportunities to institute policies for social change. In one of his final reports on the project, Beer overtly acknowledged the importance of regulation in the process of socialist change: envision our invention as an instrument of revolution. [ mean that ‘The Way of Production’ is still a necessary feature of the Chilean revolution, but that "The ‘Way of Regulation’ is an extra requitement of a complex world not experienced by Marx or Lenin. °5 Brain of the Firm 323, °* “On Decybernation” 5. 39In ight of Beer's experience applying cybemetic principles to the Chilean political situation, his new interpretation of revolution is understandable. However, it seems more plausible that this newfound emphasis on regulation did not stem from a change in world complexity or from an oversight in Marx's philosophy. Rather it embodies how science and technology can influence and redefine our conceptualizations of political order and the tools available for orchestrating social change. On the morning of September 11, 1973, the Chilean military launched a coup against the Allende government. It began in the city of Valparaiso and continued to gather strength as the military traveled south toward Santiago. By 2 p.m. Allende was dead, his dream incinerated by the flames engulfing the presidential patace. As news of the coup filtered into project headquarters, members of the Cybersyn team began to destroy the Cyberstride programs tapes in accordance with plans they made months earlier in case the government did not survive. Like the critics who condemned Cybersyn's construction, the team recognized the system's potential for oppression as well as for greater freedom. If they could not see the Cybersyn project realized, they could at least prevent the system from falling into the wrong hands, particularly those of the United States. Within a half- hour, all of the program tapes were destroyed. Without the tapes, the team concluded the potency of the system would dissipate; it would return to a mere collection of parts rather than a synergetic whole, Before the military could secure their grip on the next 16 years of Chilean history, Cybersyn ceased to exist.Bibliography John Adams "Everything Under Control,” Science for People, no. 21 (April-May 1973). Salvador Allende, Chile’s Road to Socialism, (Baltimore: Penguin Books, Ltd., 1973). W. Ross Ashby, An Introduction to Cybernetics (London: Chapman and Hall, 1956). Michael Becket, "Beer: The Hope of Chile", The Daily Telegraph Magazine, August 10, 1973. Stafford Beer, Brain of the Firm (New York: John Wiley and Sons, 1974). Stafford Beer, Designing Freedom (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1974). Stafford Beer, Platform for Change, (New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1975). Stafford Beer, interview by author, tape recording, Toronto, Canada, 15-16 March 2001. 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