Nature Future Conditional

The story behind the story: The Congress

This week, Futures is pleased to welcome Dave Kavanaugh with his story The Congress. Based in the Netherlands, Dave will publish his first novel, Age of Omicron, in October. You find out more about his work at his website or by following him on Twitter. Here, he reveals the political machinations that gave rise to his latest tale — as ever, it pays to read the story first.

Writing The Congress

My first draft of any story tends to be a bloated mess of sloppy world-building and overly detailed character backstory. With each additional editing pass, I carve away the story’s fat and gristle to find its true substance. In the case of The Congress, I realized what I wanted to do first and foremost was tell an idea story, almost like those of Asimov and Clarke. Specifically, the piece strives to answer — or at least to ask — two basic questions:

Are the qualities that make someone electable in a modern democracy ever synonymous with the qualities of a good leader?

and…

If a political system works, does it matter if it’s based on deception?

I composed my original draft of The Congress several years ago when these questions were more or less academic for me. The first question pertained to the machine’s curiosity and the second was reflected in Mari’s inner conflict. When I recently dug up the story to edit it afresh and submit it to Nature, I found that both questions had taken on new meaning and import.

In the midst of rising political tension and populism movements around the globe, a tale of AI government gone right sounds optimistic indeed. This is not to say that there aren’t ‘Mari’s in real life. I’ve no doubt there are dedicated, hard-working, intelligent civic workers who would take pride not only in achieving high rank, but in enacting positive change in the world. But in the cut-throat reality show of modern politics, can we hope that such an individual can come out on top? If recent high-profile elections are any indication, that seems increasingly unlikely. So even as AI technology advances and the possibility of thinking machine leadership becomes less and less improbable, one wonders if the type of power-hungry individual able to fight their way into a position of authority would ever give up that power and replace the very system that enabled them to succeed.

As for governments based on deception, I think many people have come to believe this is already a reality, leading some to abandon hope and others to embrace activism. Perhaps AI government could appeal to both groups. I think the more interesting question (at least from the point of view of an author obsessed with character motivation) is if the real-life Mari’s have the same reaction when they finally reach the positions to which they aspire. Do they face the same choice Mari did in the story, having to either turn and run from their dreams or else sacrifice their values and drink poisons of their own? At least in The Congress the system she sacrifices herself to is a system that works.

As these ideas ping-ponged around my mind, I considered them through the POV of a character that interested me. The result was the final version of The Congress.

In the end, the tone of The Congress might be bittersweet but the message is clearly hopeful. I guess only time will tell whether this optimistic little story is prophetic science fiction, or else pure fantasy. In the meantime, I suspect many of us would gladly hand the reins of political power over to an Atari 800 rather than put up with our present leadership. Pong/Pac-Man 2020, anyone?

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