What Is Technocracy?

Technocracy means government by technicians guided by the imperatives of their technology: technical experts, rather than elected politicians or business leaders, make decisions. On the Atlas, this family also groups other state-led and… The Atlas covers 16 technocratic ideologies, listed below with their estimated positions.

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Technocracy explained

Technocracy means government by technicians guided by the imperatives of their technology: technical experts, rather than elected politicians or business leaders, make decisions. On the Atlas, this family also groups other state-led and regime-specific models (such as developmentalism, Kemalism and Stalinism) that do not fit the left–right families.

Core ideas

Control of industry should pass from business to engineers and experts.
Technological abundance would make economics based on scarcity obsolete.

Origins

The technocracy movement emerged in the United States early in the 20th century as part of the Progressive movement and drew wide interest during the Great Depression.

Associated thinkers

Thorstein Veblen, Howard Scott

Based on Britannica: Technocracy (checked October 20, 2026).

Types of technocracy on the Atlas

Ideology	Economic	Social	Authority
Technocracy	50	32	56
Technocratic Authoritarianism	46	39	82
State Capitalism	51	51	80
Developmentalism	48	43	50
State Corporatism	36	81	78
Bonapartism	50	81	86
Caesarism	57	88	89
Kemalism	47	33	69
Juche	3	85	92
Stalinism	0	76	94
Democratic Technocracy	52	27	33
Participatory Democracy	51	30	18
Direct Democracy	52	34	15
Federalism	65	40	22
Confederalism	56	33	19
Localism	62	58	19

Economic: 0 collective/planned – 100 market. Social: 0 progressive – 100 traditional. Authority: 0 libertarian – 100 authoritarian. How these are calculated.

Average position of the family

Map dimension	Score (0–100)	Reading
Economic Collective / planned ↔ Market	45	near the center
Social Progressive ↔ Traditional	52	near the center
Authority Libertarian ↔ Authoritarian	56	near the center
National identity Cosmopolitan ↔ Nationalist	67	toward nationalist
Foreign policy Non-intervention ↔ Intervention	55	near the center

Simple average of the 16 ideologies above; the family is a grouping used by the Atlas, not a single doctrine.