Universal Utopia?

Sorry for the late post—I just finished the book and did not want to post without having completed it. I’m glad I waited because the book really changes in the last 150 pages or so. (I also thought it was interesting how, perhaps to mirror the thesis of Shev’s work about the relation of time, the story is related in a way that parallels past and present—they both gain intensity at about the same points so that the suspense of the past actions contributes to the suspense about what is occurring when Shev is on Urras. But I digress…)

Having not been a very heavy reader of Science Fiction in the past, I was surprised at how chalk-full this book was of content highly pertinent to IR—different forms of governments, the interactions between cultures, protectionism, and a myriad of other issues. I also reflected that perhaps a key value of using science fiction as a platform for which to delve into a more speculative IR debate is that Science Fiction essentially allows an author to isolate whichever variables her or she chooses that would not be as possible in other genres. I also think that Science Fiction, as opposed to other genres, necessarily involves politics and political systems because it involves considering what would order different worlds.

What I also find interesting is that the citizens of Anarres feel exclusion of outsiders is necessary in order to preserve the status quo. It seems contradictory to their preached values on solidarity to fear what outsiders would bring. If the system were indeed a very utopian, ideal system, wouldn’t outsiders recognize it as such? The implication seems to be that it would take a special person to understand Anarres. The question is then raised about whether it is human nature to embrace a system like the one modeled in Anarres, or whether those values are not universally applicable enough to appeal to anyone who would journey into the society. If you look at our present society, this seems to be the general consensus about democracy--once people experience for themselves, they will realize its inherent worth and not want to return to a non-democratic government.

I could not help thinking, when reading LeGuin’s descriptions of Anarres, how similar some aspects were to Cuba, where I studied abroad last semester. Obviously, the big difference is the amount of formal state control that exists in Cuba vs. the anarchical nature of Anarres, but many aspects of the society are what were envisioned as the goals for the Cuban Revolution—a permanent revolution, solidarity, work for the sake of work. In my time in Cuba, it seemed to me that the Cuban experiment, while noteworthy, is very much only propped up by government because of the weaknesses in its system. For this reason, I was quite resistant to acquiesce to the interpretation of Anarres as a utopia. The experiment on Anarres appeared to be beginning to atrophy into a dystopia, as hierarchy and bureaucracy had again emerged, although no one would admit to it. However, I think that by the end of the book I was much more willing to admit to the value of such a minimalist society (though I still do not think it would be my utopia…perhaps all utopias depend on the person conceiving them?). I kept questioning which is the worse evil: a society like Anarres, where people can spreak freely about most things except to explicitly admit to the shortcomings of the system (for example, when Sabul is obviously very ingrained into the power structure but no one will expliticly acknowledge this in public because to admit such a thing exists in their society would be blasphemous), or a society like Urras, where people are bound by materialism. I think that one of the conclusions we may draw is that both societies have walls, albeit much different ones.