DES 40B Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Late Capitalism, Paternalism
LECTURE 4: 4/12/18: VISITING MORRIS IN “NOWHERE”
• News from Nowhere (1890) - Morris’s book
o Describes a future society based on common ownership and democratic control
of production
o Utopia (no place or nowhere): an imagined place or state of things in which
everything is perfect
o Based in Morris’ own house
o About another England in which life is perfect: no need to define art; art becomes
the same as life
• Craft as a gentle revolution: a reversal of the “alienation” of machine production
• “Innate Socialism”
o In 1870s, Morris began to take an active interest in politics
▪ Became an important figure in socialism emergence in Britain
o Believed society should evolve
▪ without violent revolution towards class cooperation with essential
industries and social services owned or regulated by the community as a
whole
• Craft versus “alienation”
o Morris believe craft freed workers from “alienation” (isolation, separation)
imposed by capitalism
▪ Capitalism: production controlled by private owners for profit
• Tends to treat objects and humans as interchangeable to
maximize efficiency
o Morris created production based on the guild system and craft
▪ Intended to put worker-designers back in touch with objects they were
making to beautify others’ lives
▪ Whole item was made and assembled by an individual or small group for
customers who appreciated the true value of the product
• Utopian Independence/Autonomy
o Arts and Crafts was exploring the possibility of independent production to
challenge the dominance of big commerce
• Design as a Means of Social Activism
o Design can be deployed as social activism/focus on labor issues, as well as just
serve commercial clients
o Can function as independent media
o Craft can be a protest, or an attempt to “hack” the alienating and destructive
processes of industrialization
o Conservation
▪ Morris also wanted to protect the natural world and pre-industrial world
from industrialization from encroachment of industrialization
▪ thinking about Nature as a teacher, rather than a resource for our use
• Socialism or Capitalism as the best way of changing the world?
o Steve Jobs was influenced by the Arts and Crafts attentional to design
o He rejected socialism and believed in unregulated capitalism and libertarianism
▪ Embrace of hyper-capitalism was norm on Silicon Valley entrepreneurs
• Contradictions?
o 1. Romantic and Paternalistic
▪ Morris’s enterprise seemed Romantic
▪ Merton Abbey works experiment was a little paternalistic
• Restricting the freedom and responsibilities of subordinates in
their supposed interest
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