Reflections on the Progress Conference

Two weeks ago I got to attend the Progress Conference. The conference is the most prominent event of the nascent Progress Movement. If you’re not familiar with the Progress Movement, I think Jason Crawford’s introductory essay is the best explainer.

The 19th century philosophy of progress was naive. But the 20th century turn away from progress was no solution.

We need a new philosophy of progress for the 21st century. One that teaches people not to take the modern world for granted. One that acknowledges the problems of progress, confronts them directly, and offers solutions. And one that holds up a positive vision of the future.

The conference gathered about 350 people for four days to think about the challenges we’re facing today and how we might solve them. It was small enough for easy introductions and rich discussions, but large enough to represent a range of perspectives and backgrounds. I was excited to attend the conference, and it exceeded my expectations.

For an intellectual gathering in the Bay Area, I expected the tone to be what I remembered from living and working in San Francisco in the 2010’s. Well to the left of center, with a universal assumption that everyone present must be a “progressive” and partisan Democrat. Anxious about perceived existential threats. Eager to signal virtue, and afraid to offend.

Instead I found something more interesting and more difficult to describe. The discussions were unassuming, civil, and largely apolitical. The lack of performative virtue signaling was notable, and even the subject of occasional jokes. The event was family-friendly, with childcare provided throughout — something I’ve never seen at a conference before — yet I don’t think I’d call it “pro-natal;” the issue was not front and center. It felt like a bunch of people just being normal, sharing an unspoken agreement that there’s some version of “a good life” that the vast majority of us wanted to take part in. Perhaps “Pragmatic Optimism” is the best label I can give.¹

Among the people I spoke with, I heard a generally shared understanding that:

• The mid-century high modernists (aka technocrats) greatly damaged our culture of progress by imposing orderly but dumb systems from the top down, and abusing power along the way.

• The reactionary responses of vetocracy and de-growth stopped the abuse of power by locking in the status quo, but don’t offer solutions to today’s problems.

• We need to restore a culture of dynamism and innovation, and find a new way forward.

The conference consisted of lively debate and discussion on how, exactly, we should restore dynamism, and what the way forward looks like. I heard challenging opinions shared constructively, and perceived a genuine openness to ideas that I haven’t often experienced in other venues.

The conference sessions focused heavily on the future, and in particular on coming changes in technology, policy, and society. A few themes that stood out to me:

• The amount and diversity of energy technology being developed right now surprised me. From things as “futuristic” as modular nuclear reactors to the creative mundanity of using dirt as batteries, there was just a lot more going on than I realized. While some of the discussion was about how we legalize massive transmissions projects again, a lot of it centered on scaling and deploying less centralized technologies. I came away feeling more optimistic about the next generation of the energy industry.

• In my opinion, Autonomy continues to be the most under-recognized technology of the decade. During the conference I got to tour the Zipline factory in South SF, and afterward I rode in a Waymo for the first time.

  Andrew Miller
  is doing the best work to try and prepare us all for what’s coming, but it seems that few people have internalized that driving is effectively optional now, or that a large share of deliveries in the future will be made by aerial drones. I think this will substantially change the economics of transportation, which presents an opportunity to make our cities work better.

• At the conference I learned more about California Forever via a session with the developer. Candidly, I went in expecting to be disappointed. Instead I was delighted by the project’s dense, walkable, human-scale design, and its approach of creating a permissive platform to be built up by many hands. To get a better sense of the project, I recommend Aaron Lubeck’s description of the design, and

  Michael Natelli
  ’s more general description of the approach. I don’t know about the financing or infrastructure phasing, so I can’t speak to those aspects, but after seeing the vision I’m rooting for its success.

Two takeaways that I might write about more in the future:

First, I loved Charles Mann and Virginia Postrel’s session on “How the System Works,” in which they discussed how the systems we depend on for food, water, power, and public health were built up over time, and how much ongoing effort is required to maintain them. Strong Towns is deeply focused on the importance of maintenance, so it’s no surprise this talk spoke to me. That kind of work is not widely celebrated, or even well-known, but it should be!

While there was some discussion of labor and education at the conference, I think there should be more. Mann could have been a keynote speaker, perhaps interviewed by

Kelly Vedi

, connecting his story of the importance of our foundational civil infrastructure, and the critical operations and maintenance work it requires, with her work on building and maintaining the skilled workforce society needs to do it. The future has to be exciting to more than just the engineers and policy wonks. Centering the value and importance of skilled trades to the positive vision of the future is an opportunity to make the “Progress” narrative more broadly inclusive and compelling.

Second, in the weeks since the conference I’ve been thinking a lot about the aesthetics of “Progress.” It’s slightly ironic that the Roots of Progress speaks against the overreach of the mid-century high modernists, but embraces a retro-future aesthetic that directly emulates their visual style. I think this “works” because at this point that mid-century aesthetic is actually not avant-garde, but rather pays a nostalgic homage to the sentiments of an earlier time. In so doing it provides a continuity to the past in our time that it didn’t in its own.

I think that continuity with the past is actually an important element of the culture of Progress. Again, for the narrative to be broadly inclusive and compelling, people need to be able to see themselves living in and enjoying the positive vision of the future. The best vision of the future integrates the novel with the familiar, and perpetuates the most successful and beloved elements of our present, even as they continue to improve. To that end, I see an opportunity for the Progress movement to cross-pollinate with classical arts, architecture, and education movements. At first glance these ideas may seem to point in opposite directions, but I think their deeper goals values are actually quite similar.

A closing thought: as with all great conferences, the best part was the chance to meet and talk with so many interesting people. Thank you to everyone who attended for the incredible discussions! I’m grateful to the Roots of Progress for organizing the event, and for inviting me to join the writing fellowship and the conference. And most of all, I’m excited to discover a new and growing community of pragmatic optimists to collaborate with, and already looking forward to joining again next year.

1. In trying to describe the event, I was tempted to quote, “Not left, not right. Forward.” That’s the tagline of the Forward Party, whose values certainly align with the Progress Movement, and the themes of the Progress Conference. However, I’m not involved with the Forward Party and don’t actually know anything about them besides their marketing material, and I didn’t hear them mentioned at the conference. So as much as they seem aligned, at the moment I’m not aware of any crossover.