The Betrayal by Technology: A Portrait of Jacques Ellul [Video]

Summary

Jacques Ellul was a French theologian/sociologist and anarchist. He first became well-known to American readers when his book The Technological Society was published in English in 1964.

This book leveled a broad critique of technique, a term that means more than gadgets and machines – as the English word technology means.

For Ellul, technique represented an entire way of life characterized by life fragmented so that efficiency ultimately rules over all ethical decisions.

Ellul warned that technique was having drastic effects on all aspects of modern life. His books, Anarchy and Christianity, The Politics of God and the Politics of Man are two examples of how his political and religious outlooks mutually reinforced one another.

Many Green Anarchists have cited Ellul’s work on technique as influential on their thought.

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