"Technocracy has evolved from socialism to neoliberalism"

"The first technocrat was Saint-Simon, a utopian socialist. Today, the concept of technocracy is associated rather with large international organizations, what some call, in quotes, neoliberalism. There is an evolution from socialism to liberal technocracy, going through social democracy. "

This was summarized yesterday by the political scientist José Andrés Fernández Leost (San Juan de Luz, France, 1977) the future of technocracy, affecting a debate that has returned to the forefront in the context of the political climate derived from the economic crisis. Leost placed special emphasis on the moment in which Mario Monti assumed the position of Prime Minister of Italy, in an appointment presented as an eminently technocratic solution. "At least in people's perception, technocracy has evolved from left to right," said the rapporteur.

"Technocracy and end of ideologies: myths and realities" was the title of the conference delivered at the Gustavo Bueno Foundation in Oviedo. Fernández Leost is a doctor with a thesis carried out at the Complutense University that deals with the political thought of Gustavo Bueno. He currently works at the Carolina Foundation, an entity whose objective is to promote cultural relations and educational and scientific cooperation between Spain and Latin America.

Question the elites

"The word technocracy describes very varied realities; that technocracy has a unitary ideology is a myth. There are many left and right technocracies, just as there are populisms of left and right," said the political scientist. In his opinion, "today we see a dichotomy between technocrats and populists, as if we had to opt for one or the other, but this is a simplification. Actually, there are many nuances. For some, democracy is threatened by populism For others, it is technocracy that threatens democracy, "he said.

In Leost's analysis, the debate about technocracy is related "to the questioning of elites, all the more so as populism is often defined as an anti-elitist trend." In its historical tracking, he found a clear evolution: "Today technocrats are rather associated with the institutional system, with the status quo. In the past, technocracy was associated with progressive ideas." If the nineteenth-century technocrat was linked to the idea of ​​progress, of industry, post-World War II had more to do with the end of ideologies, of convergence between them, between capitalism and communism; Due to the conditions of industrial society, technocracy alluded to a mixed economy. "In Spain, technocracy experienced a great boom with Franco's developmentalism," he said.

Approaching time, Fernández Leost evoked statements by Jean Claude Junker, president of the European Commission, "in which he pointed out something like 'we all know what needs to be done, what we don't know is how to get reelected once we have done it. 'That is, what solutions to problems may exist, the question is how to make citizens see them acceptable, "the political scientist argued.