A craft we must be proud of and defend
TECHNOLOGY shaking up a trade is hardly a new phenomenon. Johannes Gutenberg’s moveable type press caused a bit of a stir over 500 years ago. So it’s often troubled me that we tend to see the threat of technological change to the exclusion of the opportunities it offers.
That’s why I was so pleased to read Paul Mason’s comments in the last issue. “We have to be the guardians of a craft,” he said. That’s a significant statement.
As he admits, progressive thought has long viewed the defence of craft as elitist. But if we don’t have pride in what we do, how can we defend and develop the craft?
Embracing the defence of our craft turns the struggle over technological development from a defensive one into something that looks forward and creates possibilities.
We also begin to change the basis upon which decisions are made. Should technology just be used to work faster and more cheaply? Or can it be used to improve not just the craft but the conditions of those who practise it?
Much of what passes for analysis of journalism’s development consists solely of telling us what “will” happen. It’s our job to ask “why?” and “in whose interest?”
The development of its training programme shows that the NUJ is doing something practical to implement the view that those who practise the trade should develop it. We need to build on this, making the NUJ an essential part of the process of craft development. Unions which take on this bigger project will survive whereas those which focus solely on the conditions of labour won’t.
Paul Mason has sparked an important discussion — far more useful than the doom-mongering which often passes for analysis. It’s not technology itself that presents the threat, but who controls it and the uses to which it is put, and that should be our focus.
Martin Cloake
London SE26