That’s an interesting connection to make. I am not familiar with the argument in detail, but at first glance I agree that the RAAP concept is meant to capture some principled institutional relationship between different cross-sections of society. I might disagree with “The Narrow Corridor” argument to the extent that RAAPs are not meant to prioritize or safeguard individual liberty so much as articulate a principled relationship between markets and states; according to RAAPs, the most likely path to multi-polar failure is particular forms of market failure that might require new grounds for antitrust enforcement of AI firms. The need for antitrust and antimonopoly policy is thus a straightforward rejection of the idea that enlightenment values will generate some kind of natural steady state where liberty is automatically guaranteed. I develop some of these ideas in my whitepaper on the political economy of reinforcement learning; I’m curious to hear how you see those arguments resonating with Acemoglu and Robinson.
Good point relating it to markets. I think I don’t understand Acemoglu and Robinson’s perspective well enough here, as the relationship between state, society and markets is the biggest questionmark I left the book with. I think A&R don’t necessarily only mean individual liberty when talking about power of society, but the general influence of everything that falls in the “civil society” cluster.
I was reminded of the central metaphor of Acemoglu and Robinson’s “The Narrow Corridor” as a RAAP candidate:
civil society wants to be able to control the government & undermines government if not
the government wants to become more powerful
successful societies inhabit a narrow corridor in which strengthening governments are strongly coupled with strengthening civil societies
That’s an interesting connection to make. I am not familiar with the argument in detail, but at first glance I agree that the RAAP concept is meant to capture some principled institutional relationship between different cross-sections of society. I might disagree with “The Narrow Corridor” argument to the extent that RAAPs are not meant to prioritize or safeguard individual liberty so much as articulate a principled relationship between markets and states; according to RAAPs, the most likely path to multi-polar failure is particular forms of market failure that might require new grounds for antitrust enforcement of AI firms. The need for antitrust and antimonopoly policy is thus a straightforward rejection of the idea that enlightenment values will generate some kind of natural steady state where liberty is automatically guaranteed. I develop some of these ideas in my whitepaper on the political economy of reinforcement learning; I’m curious to hear how you see those arguments resonating with Acemoglu and Robinson.
Good point relating it to markets. I think I don’t understand Acemoglu and Robinson’s perspective well enough here, as the relationship between state, society and markets is the biggest questionmark I left the book with. I think A&R don’t necessarily only mean individual liberty when talking about power of society, but the general influence of everything that falls in the “civil society” cluster.