Networks are a relatively new concept to hit our culture. Obviously, it’s been there in the background for a while, but it was only with the invent and widespread adoption of the internet that the concept really took root and started growing in the culture. As a result, we began to see it radically challenge the way we think of human organization.

Top-down hierarchies had prevailed throughout much of Western history under the twin powers of feudalism and the pyramidal structure of the Catholic Church. But with the rise of the internet, ordinary people began to see first-hand just how exciting and effective non-hierarchical systems of organization could really be.

Two great examples are file-sharing and the open-source movement. Each of these movements consists of extremely loose networks of people, each of who contributes what resources they can to further some cultural goal. Both also eschew top-down systems of distribution, and exist almost wholly outside of traditional corporate profit structures. File-sharing, especially, has seen a resultant backlash by corporate powers afraid of not only losing profits, but of having people realize that they can function just fine outside their aegis. As a result, you had all those preposterous high-profile lawsuits to scare people back into the system. This is an important lesson, I think: that the spirit of sharing and “love” can lead people outside the system, but it only takes a crack of the Whip of Fear to herd us all back in.

Enter terrorism. While the backlash against file-sharing is designed to counter a specific network behavior, I believe the mythology of terrorism is ultimately designed to villify and reverse network thinking. Just for a moment, look at the language of terrorism. How frequently have you heard the term “terrorist networks” or even better: “shadowy networks”? It’s pretty damn common in the media. The other thing you can do is read materials which talk about the challenges of fighting terrorist networks. You’ll quickly realize that they aren’t so much talking about how to wage war on terrorism as they are talking about how to wage war on network thinking.

Leaders bent on maintaining hierarchical control are not the only people who have been villifying network-style organization though. It also just so happens to be a huge aspect of modern conspiracy theory. The whole concept of “secret societies” really is just the other side of the coin. Secret societies essentially function according to the same principles we’ve been indoctrinated to hate among shadowy terrorist networks. These are organizations of loosely affiliated people who have infiltrated important positions for nefarious ends. It’s really no different from the fear that your next door neighbor is a terrorist - except that it’s pointed from the people up to the leaders, rather than vice-versa.

The weirdest part of all this though is that network-organization is really the best model for how people naturally interact. Sure there are always leaders in a group, but the structure of a network is probably the most workable one for describing you and your friends and family. Cellular phone service, I think, takes advantage of this more natural and neutral aspect of network organization. How many times have you seen ads for “in-network calling” where they have a little circle and a line connecting each member of the network? Even the word “cell phone” is ominously close to “terror cell”. And cell-phone companies train us to look for “reliable networks”. How funny would it be to see a cell phone commercial which featured conversations between terrorists or secret society members?

It’s weird how when a style of thinking hits the big time in a culture, it gets used by different groups at completely cross-purposes. I guess it’s like that Jacques Ellul dude Jeremy is always quoting: that technology expands to fill all its potential applications. Seems that the same thing holds true for social metaphors.