Vortrag von Mario Bianchini (ZZF Potsdam): Knowledge is Power: The Binary Logic of Energy and the Black Boxing of Modernity in Divided Germany

Erste Veranstaltung des Berlin-Brandenburger Colloquiums für Umweltgeschichte (BBC) im Sommersemester 2026, das zu drei Terminen im Mai und Juni einlädt.

Veranstalter: Leibniz-Zentrum für Zeithistorische Forschung Potsdam

Montag, 18. Mai 2026 | 18-20 Uhr

Zum Vortrag
Mario Bianchini (ZZF Potsdam): Knowledge is Power: The Binary Logic of Energy and the Black Boxing of Modernity in Divided Germany

This presentation is part of a larger book project that interrogates the construction of "energy knowledge" not as a static repository of scientific facts, but as a fluid, politically charged reductionist framework that mediates the relationship between modernity, power, and the public sphere. By examining the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany, I argue that both ideologies, despite their rhetorical opposition, converged on a shared "energo-political" logic that prioritizes the maximization of work and productivity over the flourishing of life or ecological integrity. Furthermore, I argue that energy functions as a "black box" within these systems, where complex socio-technical realities are systematically reduced down into politically advantageous and sanitized visualizations. These reductions serve to obscure the material grit of extraction and the environmental costs of consumption, effectively transforming the finite nature of resources into an illusion of infinite availability through market imaginaries and technological optimism.
More specifically, this presentation explores how the representation of energy infrastructure acts as a binary logic gate. Depending on the prevailing political or economic imperative, energy knowledge acted as a switch that toggled between two contradictory states: a "0" position framing energy as clean, limitless, and infrastructurally visible, and a "1" position framing it as scarce and precious, requiring conservation, rendering infrastructure invisible. The paper posits that the black boxing of energy knowledge as two separate, but equally impenetrable vaults prevented deeper questioning of energetic modernity, resulting in a public understanding of energy that was detached from ontological reality and deeply entangled with the imperatives of industrial growth. Ultimately, the larger project that this presentation stems from suggests that the crisis of the Anthropocene is rooted not merely in technological failure, but in the epistemological structures of modernity that render the biosphere invisible in favor of the continuous circulation of commodities and the relentless drive for efficiency.

Short Bio: 
Mario Bianchini is a research assistant at the Centre for Contemporary History Potsdam. His work focuses on the utopian promises of technology, with a current focus on the creation and dissemination of “energy knowledge.” He holds a PhD in the History and Sociology of Technology and Science from the Georgia Institute of Technology. His first book, Real-Existing Utopia, examines how the GDR leveraged the promise of a future technological utopia to preserve the status quo and is currently under review with the MIT Press.