ABSTRACT
This chapter concentrates on the concept of “techno-solutionism” as an abbreviation of a taken-for-granted presumption that guides pragmatist policies designed to solve problems of human security and welfare. By purifying socioeconomic planning with advanced mathematical models, planning itself is made to appear as “technology” based on reliable “technique” and related instruments. The instruments in question are digital models that can predict future development at high speed and with enormous amount of data. This general taken-for-granted idea is sensible in contexts where the problems to be solved and strategic aims can be clearly defined and stay consistent long enough in time and space. We argue that the task of defining the problems to be solved and building strategies to solve them is severely undermined by the complexities that characterize contemporary institutionalization of science, research, and technology. We conclude that the contemporary economic policies and societal planning which is rooted in techno-solutionist planning practices do not serve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To realize the SDGs, a shift toward Schumpeterian “creative destruction” of the present oligarchic capitalist system of economic growth is needed.
