So, the federal ban on trade with Cuba is silly, right? Sure. What about Syria and North Korea? Not so sure.
Today, an anonymous Slashdotter posted about a legal caveat that would prevent sales of the OLPC computers to countries that are prohibited from trading with the United States.
“In a move going largely unnoticed by developers, the OLPC project now requires all submissions to be hosted in the RedHat Fedora project. While this may not seem like a big deal, the implications are interesting. First, contributors have to sign the Fedora Project Individual Contributor License Agreement. By being forced to submit contributions to the Fedora repository they automatically fall under the provisions of US export law. So, no OLPC for Cuba, Syria and the like. Ever.”
On a personal level, this underlies the absurdity of US trade law. I mean, there are obviously instances when our country doesn’t want to stuff the coffers of dictators by allowing trade to continue. That being said, I believe that more often than not trade sanctions harm the people of a country more than the targeted ruling class. One example is Iraq following the first Gulf War; where many sick and children went hungry and died as a result of trade sanctions.
While surely little green laptops are less essential to life than food or medicine, intentionally preventing this technology from proliferating in dictatorships and rogue states of various sorts seems a little short sighted. Devices like the OLPC are small, flexible and provide for an increased access to information. Alongside this increased access to this information is the opportunity for education and collaboration.
Henry Jenkins, via Convergence Culture, introduced me to Pierre Levy. In a 1997 publication called Collective Intelligence: Mankind’s Emerging World in Cyberspace, Levy argues that technology (like the OLPC) can create new mechanisms of power.
To quote Jenkins paraphrasing Levy:
New kinds of political power will emerge which will operate alongside and sometimes directly challenge the hegemony of the nation state or the economic might of corporate capitalism. Levy sees such knowledge around the world as the best way of breaking down the devisions and suspicions that currently shape international relations. Levy sees such knowledge communities as central to the task of restoring democratic citizenship.
You read that? Restoring democratic citizenship. Thats right. Sure its one hell of a pipe dream, but in the least can’t we agree that all people on the plant have some basic right to access the information and participate in dialog with our species?