Ian Martin 21.3.14Review of James C. Scott!

Seeing Like a State: !How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed!!

In Seeing Like a State (1998), Yale professor of Political Science and Anthropology James C.

Scott, aims to show the underlying reasons for the spectacular failures of twentieth century states

utopian ambitions. His book represents a broad, illuminating and ambitious study of a key question

in contemporary history. This review will seek to briefly trace the major content and argument of the

book while offering a critical perspective on his thesis and aiming to place it within a growing body

of literature which critiques modernist assumptions. !

!Firstly, the book outlines the conditions under which the vast schemes of social-engineering in the

twentieth century have arisen. Scott agues the existence of the modern state and the way it

functions has been predicated on methods of making its citizenry legible, such as permanent

surnames, and systems of land tenure and city planning. This mapping of nations gave states the

means to attempt to implement far-reaching plans for improving the human condition. Coupled with

burgeoning scientific advancement, high-modernist ideology gave them the impetus for such plans,

and particular situations where civil society happened to lay prostrate allowed for their unresisted

implementation. But the central question which the book aims to answer is, given all this, why did

the schemes then fail? Scotts response is that when these conditions have obtained, catastrophic

results ensued because modernist states, regardless of political persuasion, disregarded local,

practical knowledge (metis) in favour of a blind faith in scientific, supposedly universal (techne)

knowledge. To illustrate this, Scott points to the examples of Soviet collectivisation, forced

villagisation in Tanzania and high-modernist city planning among others. Thus, at heart, Scott

argues twentieth-century utopian social-engineering schemes failed because: The progenitors of

such plans regarded themselves as far smarter and far-seeing than they really were and, at the

same time, regarded their subjects as far more stupid and incompetent than they really

were (343). !

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Ian Martin 21.3.14Writing in an engaging way, Scotts study offers a penetrating genealogy of modern forms of

government, giving the reader a new interpretive lens with which to view history, as well as

providing tools to steer future state plans. Overall, he offers a convincing case for the value of

traditional knowledge in statecraft, not over and against scientific knowledge, but as a necessary

and helpful companion to it. True to the message of his book, he does not attack high-modernist

utopian attempts at the level of theoretical, techne knowledge designed to deconstruct its ideology,

but instead uses the practical, metis knowledge derived through twentieth-century experience to

show its shortcomings. This is skilful historical work which is consistent with its own principles and

gives a healthy challenge to the presumptive universality of scientific knowledge while also

fascinatingly revealing a key aspect of modern statecraft in the form of creating national legibility.!

!Published in 1998, with the benefit of current perspective, it is clear that Scotts work fits strongly

into the trends of its post-Soviet, 1990s milieu. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Francis Fukuyama

had bravely declared the End of History while Samuel Huntington had forecasted the end of

ideologies and the coming resurgence of traditional sources of knowledge and identity, especially

religion. Bruno Latour in We Have Never Been Modern (1993) had also directly challenged the

idea that modernity was based on objective scientific knowledge. Also, although coming from

another perspective, Scott can be seen to be in line with more recent writers such as John Milbank,

Charles Taylor and Michael Allen Gillespie who have aimed to point out the inherently theological

bases and assumptions of supposedly non-religious modernity. !

!Thus, ultimately, Scott argues the failure of rationalism, quoting Blaise Pascal, is not its

recognition of technical knowledge, but its failure to recognise any other. It was its chronological

snobbery which blinded high-modernity to its own assumptions and, under the right

circumstances, led to incredible human suffering. Now recognised to form part of a wider literature

along similar lines, Scott argues that modern states must temper their faith in science with a

healthy respect for traditional wisdom derived from centuries of authentic human experience. !

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Ian Martin 21.3.14While an overall success, from a critical perspective there are certain aspects of the book which

perhaps could have been amplified to a greater extent, and others which in the light of current

times now seem to be dated. For instance, in the first part of the book, Scott states that the

standardising and codification of language was the most important method of making nations

legible to the state, yet far too little space (one page and a half) is dedicated to this process. In

comparison, processes such as city planning, land tenure, and the codification of measurements

and surnames are given scores of pages. Given that language is offered in Scotts conclusion as

the best model for social planninga structure of meaning and continuity that is never still and ever

open to the improvisation of all its speakersScott offers surprisingly little analysis in this arena.

Aside from this statement, it seems that further exploration of this would offer a clearer picture of

what a balanced state would look like in Scotts view. !

!Secondly, from a contemporary perspective, there is a glaring feature of the present world which is

missing: the advent of the internet. It would be fascinating for Scott to reappraise his thesis in light

of the internet age, asking to what extent the internet revolution may present an opportunity for the

resurgence of practical knowledge in opposition to scientific knowledge. For instance, in the

context of high-modernist, authoritarian regimes which are currently in power, it seems that the

internet provides a way for people to resist legibility and express an identity that is much less

controlled by the state. While of course it could not have been expected that Scott would include

this in his 1998 book, perhaps a second edition with a chapter on legibility in the internet age would

now be appropriate. !

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