I recently read an article that said the parallel to draw is not with any of the futuristic fictions, but to look back towards the last days of the Roman Republic.
There, the automation that drove ordinary citizens off the land and out of work was a huge influx of slave labour- the benefits of which all accrued to a tiny aristocracy which owned the slaves. This left an entire class of citizens dispossessed and angry, with no means of making a living, and ready fodder for the lies and the fear and the briibes of whatever faction of the monied class wanted them for their only remaining possession. Their votes.
Happy 2017, everyone.
