Mission Statement
(This caucus was founded on May 20, 2020. This statement was democratically made by combining the personal manifestos of 44 KRAC members who initially formed the caucus)
This caucus is formed for the purpose of understanding and producing Science and Technology, especially understanding what they mean, the foundational assumptions and epistemologies, how they are funded and produced in society, how they are used and abused, how they evolved through various class societies, how science is and was taught, and what it could become in socialism and post-work, especially with the larger circle's aim, i.e. the revolutionary potential of science in liberation of the toiling masses and the potential of science liberated itself.
The search for truth is fundamental to a socialist understanding of reality, and thus science will, it MUST, mean something quite different in socialism than just yet another tool to produce surplus and this caucus will explore the ways and means to liberate the search for truth. In class society, Science has not just been abused and perverted, it been the privilege of the ruling class and often a tool of imperialism, inequality, and class domination, and thus the caucus aims to do more than “studying” the interactions of science and society, it aims and changing these interactions tactically and planning to alter the framework strategically, through pragmatic action.
Specifically this will involve readings, thought experiments, discussions, speculation, even science fiction. Readings will be studying the labour behind science, the violence behind it, the funding as well. Studying what innovation means and how is good science done. Studying its history, geography, and politics, especially the histories which are not explored. It would mean rescuing history from fascist perversions as well. It would mean also to study where the socialistic countries succeeded and failed when they tried to do science and technology differently. It would mean studying how can technology be used well without falling into technosolutionism. It would require studying how gender, caste, class, race, geography, and age have interacted in scientific production and technology development. Various lenses, primarily Marxist, but also critical theory, and historical will be useful. To study all of this, monthly readings, collaborative writings, and discussions will be done.
In addition, as reason itself is under attack in fascism, with superstition and pseudoscience being some of the chief weapons in the fascist arsenal, rationalism and scientific practices will be explored, the ideologies around and in opposition to science will be explored.
But though reading deeply is primary, the caucus will not limit itself to reading and discussions, it will make focus groups for pedagogy, production, and propaganda for its mandate of liberating science as well. The pedagogy will be both within the caucus and with the larger circle where science and technology will be learnt and taught, the production will be focus groups collaborating on papers, both academic and mass consumption, IN ALL LANGUAGES and code and hardware, at times developing technology for the larger circle or in the interest of our politics. The propaganda will cover various media with the high aim of a quarterly science and technology magazine.
Long live Science! Long live Socialism! Long live the Kosambi Circle!
Monthly Caucus Activities
July
Meetings
August
September
Readings