Neo-Luddism or New Luddism is a philosophy opposing many forms of modern
technology. The word Luddite is generally used as a derogatory term
applied to people showing technophobic leanings. The name is based on the
historical legacy of the British Luddites, who were active between 1811
and 1816. Neo-Luddism is a leaderless movement of
non-affiliated groups who resist modern technologies and dictate a return of
some or all technologies to a more primitive level. Neo-Luddites are
characterized by one or more of the following practices: passively
abandoning the use of technology, harming those who produce technology,
advocating simple living, or sabotaging technology. The modern Neo-Luddite
movement has connections with the anti-globalization movement,
anarcho-primitivism, radical environmentalism and Deep Ecology.
Neo-Luddism is based on the concern of the technological impact on individuals,
their communities and or the environment, Neo-Luddism stipulates the
use of the precautionary principle for all new technologies, insisting that
technologies be proven safe before adoption, due to the unknown effects
that new technologies might inspire. Philosophy
Neo-Luddism calls for slowing or stopping the development of new
technologies. Neo-Luddism prescribes a lifestyle that abandons specific
technologies, because of its belief that this is the best prospect for the
future. As Robin and Webster put it, "a return to nature and what are imagined
as more natural communities." In the place of industrial capitalism,
Neo-Luddism prescribes small-scale agricultural communities such as those
of the Amish and the Chipko movement in Nepal and India as models for the
future. Neo-Luddism denies the ability of any
new technology to solve current problems, such as environmental
degradation, nuclear warfare and biological weapons, without creating
more, potentially dangerous problems. Neo-Luddites are generally opposed to
anthropocentrism, globalization and or industrial capitalism.
In 1990, attempting to reclaim the term 'luddite' and found a unified movement,
Chellis Glendinning published her "Notes towards a Neo-Luddite manifesto". In
this paper, Glendinning describes Neo-Luddites as "20th century citizens —
activists, workers, neighbors, social critics, and scholars — who question the
predominant modern worldview, which preaches that unbridled technology
represents progress." Glendinning then promotes the following principles for
the definition of Neo-Luddism: "Neo-Luddites are not anti-technology:"
Glendinning proposes that Neo-Luddites should only be against specific kinds of
technology which are destructive to communities or are materialistic and
rationalistic. "All technologies are political:"
Glendinning argues that Neo-Luddites should question if technologies have
been created for specific interests, to perpetuate their specific values.
"The personal view of technology is dangerously limited:" Glendinning thinks
that the secondary aspects of the technology need to be examined before
adoption of technology into our technological system, and not personal
benefit. = Vision of the future without
intervention= Neo-Luddism often establishes stark
predictions about the effect of new technologies. Although there is not a
cohesive vision of the ramifications of technology, Neo-Luddism predicts that a
future without technological reform has dire consequences. Neo-Luddites believe
that current technologies are a threat to humanity and to the natural world in
general, and that a future societal collapse is possible or even probable.
According to Sale, "The industrial civilization so well served by its
potent technologies cannot last, and will not last; its collapse is certain
within not more than a few decades.". Neo-Luddite Ted Kaczynski predicted a
world with a depleted environment, an increase in psychological disorders,
with either leftists who aim to control humanity through technology, or
technology directly controlling humanity. John Philip Sousa regarded the
introduction of the phonograph with suspicion, predicting: "a marked
deterioration in American music and musical taste"
These predictions include changes in humanity's place in the future due to
replacement of humans by computers, genetic decay of humans due to lack of
natural selection, biological engineering of humans, misuse of
technological power including disasters caused by genetically modified
organisms, nuclear warfare, and biological weapons; control of humanity
using surveillance, propaganda, pharmacological control, and
psychological control; humanity failing to adapt to the future manifesting as an
increase in psychological disorders, widening economic and political
inequality, widespread social alienation, a loss of community, and
massive unemployment; technology causing environmental degradation due to
shortsightedness, overpopulation, and overcrowding.
= Types of intervention= In 1990, attempting to reclaim the term
'luddite' and found a unified movement, Chellis Glendinning published her "Notes
towards a Neo-Luddite manifesto".In this paper to Glendinning proposes destroying
the following technologies: electromagnetic technologies, chemical
technologies, nuclear technologies, genetic engineering. She argues in favor
of the "search for new technological forms" which are local in scale and
promote social and political freedom. Glendinning then promotes the following
principles for the definition of Neo-Luddism:
In "The coming revolution", Ted Kaczynski outlined what he saw as
changes we are going to have to make in order to make society functional, "new
values that will free them from the yoke of the present technoindustrial system",
including: Rejection of all modern technology —
"This is logically necessary, because modern technology is a whole in which
all parts are interconnected; you can’t get rid of the bad parts without also
giving up those parts that seem good." Rejection of civilization itself
Rejection of materialism and its replacement with a conception of life
that values moderation and self-sufficiency while deprecating the
acquisition of property or of status. Love and reverence toward nature or even
worship of nature Exaltation of freedom
Punishment of those responsible for the present situation. "Scientists,
engineers, corporation executives, politicians, and so forth to make the
cost of improving technology too great for anyone to try"
= Origins of contemporary critiques of technology in literature=
According to Julian Young, Martin Heidegger was a Luddite in his early
philosophical phase and believed in the destruction of modern technology and a
return to an earlier agrarian world. However, the later Heidegger did not see
technology as wholly negative and did not call for its abandonment or
destruction. In The Question Concerning Technology, Heidegger posited that the
modern technological "mode of Being" was one which viewed the natural world,
plants, animals, and even human beings as a "standing-reserve" — resources to
be exploited as means to an end. To illustrate this "monstrousness",
Heidegger uses the example of a hydroelectric plant on the Rhine river
which turns the river from an unspoiled natural wonder to just a supplier of
hydropower. In this sense, technology is not just the collection of tools, but a
way of Being in the world and of understanding the world which is
instrumental and grotesque. According to Heidegger, this way of Being defines the
modern way of living in the West. For Heidegger, this technological process
ends up reducing beings to not-beings, which Heidegger calls 'the abandonment
of Being' and involves the loss of any sense of awe and wonder, as well as an
indifference to that loss. One of the first major contemporary
anti-technological thinkers was French philosopher Jacques Ellul. In his The
Technological Society, Ellul argued that the rationality of technology enforces
logical and mechanical organization which "eliminates or subordinates the
natural world." Ellul defined "technique" as the entire totality of
organizational methods and technology with a goal toward maximum rational
efficiency. According to Ellul, technique has an impetus which tends to
drown out human concerns: "The only thing that matters technically is yield,
production. This is the law of technique; this yield can only be
obtained by the total mobilization of human beings, body and soul, and this
implies the exploitation of all human psychic forces." Another critic of
political and technological expansion was Lewis Mumford, who wrote The Myth of
the Machine. The views of Ellul influenced the ideas of the infamous
American Neo-Luddite Ted Kaczynski, who engaged in a nationwide mail bombing
campaign, killing three people and injuring 23 others. The opening of
Kaczynski's manifesto reads: "The Industrial Revolution and its
consequences have been a disaster for the human race." Other philosophers of
technology who have questioned the validity of technological progress
include Albert Borgmann, Don Ihde and Hubert Dreyfus.
Movement Contemporary Neo-Luddites are a widely
diverse group of loosely affiliated or non affiliated groups which includes
"writers, academics, students, families, Amish, Mennonites, Quakers,
environmentalists, "fallen-away yuppies," "ageing flower children" and
"young idealists seeking a technology-free environment." Some
Luddites see themselves as victims of technology trying to prevent further
victimization(such as Citizens Against Pesticide Misuse). Others see themselves
as advocates for the natural order and resist environmental degradation by
technology. One Neo-Luddite assembly was the "Second
Neo-Luddite Congress", held April 13–15, 1996 at a Quaker meeting hall in
Barnesville, Ohio. On February 24, 2001, the "Teach-In on Technology and
Globalization" was held at Hunter College in New York city with the
purpose to bring together critics of technology and globalization. The two
figures who are seen as the movement's founders are Chellis Glendinning and
Kirkpatrick Sale. Prominent Neo-Luddites include educator S. D. George, ecologist
Stephanie Mills, Theodore Roszak, Scott Savage, Clifford Stoll, Bill McKibben,
Neil Postman, Wendell Berry, Alan Marshall and Gene Logsdon.
= Relationship to violence and vandalism=
Some Neo-Luddites use vandalism and or violence to achieve social change and
promote the cause. Kirkpatrick Sale attempts to redefine modern Neo-Luddites
as being more likely to "confine their resistance...to a kind of intellectual
and political resistance." Also the manifesto of the 'Second Luddite
Congress', which Kirkpatrick Sale took a major part in defining, rejects violent
action. If this is true there are some notable exceptions.
In May 2012, credit for the shooting of Roberto Adinolfi, an Ansaldo Nucleare
executive, was claimed by an anarchist group who targeted him for stating that
none of the deaths following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami were
caused by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster itself:
"Adinolfi knows well that it is only a matter of time before a European
Fukushima kills on our continent [...] Science in centuries past promised us a
golden age, but it is pushing us towards self destruction and slavery [...] With
our action we give back to you a small part of the suffering that you
scientists are bringing to the world." Ted Kaczynski, also known as the
Unabomber, initially sabotaged developments near his cabin but
dedicated himself to getting back at the system after discovering a road had been
built over a plateau he had considered beautiful. Between 1978 and 1995,
Kaczynski engaged in a nationwide bombing campaign against modern
technology, planting or mailing numerous home-made bombs, killing three people
and injuring 23 others. In his 1995 manifesto, Industrial Society and Its
Future, Kaczynski states: "The kind of revolution we have in mind
will not necessarily involve an armed uprising against any government. It may
or may not involve physical violence, but it will not be a POLITICAL
revolution. Its focus will be on technology and economics, not politics."
See also Ned Ludd
Anarcho-primitivism CLODO
Development criticism Deep ecology
John Zerzan Monkeywrenching
Pentti Linkola Primitivism
On the Origin of the "Influencing Machine" in Schizophrenia
Technophobia Why The Future Doesn't Need Us,
published in Wired magazine by Bill Joy References
Further reading Huesemann, M.H., and J.A. Huesemann.
Technofix: Why Technology Won’t Save Us or the Environment, New Society
Publishers, Gabriola Island, Canada, ISBN 0865717044.
Kaczynski, Theodore Technological Slavery Feral House.
Postman, Neil Technopoly: the Surrender of Culture to Technology Knopf, New
York, ISBN 0-394-58272-1 Quigley, Peter Coyote in the Maze:
Tracking Edward Abbey in a World of Words University of Utah Press, Salt
Lake City, ISBN 0-87480-563-5 Roszak, Theodore The Cult of
Information: A Neo-Luddite Treatise on High-Tech, Artificial Intelligence, and
the True Art of Thinking University of California Press, Berkeley, California,
ISBN 0-520-08584-1 Sale, Kirkpatrick Rebels Against The
Future: The Luddites And Their War On The Industrial Revolution: Lessons For
The Computer Age Basic Books, ISBN 978-0-201-40718-1
Tenner, Edward Why Things Bite Back: Technology and the Revenge of Unintended
Consequences Knopf, New York, ISBN 0-679-42563-2
External links Primitivism writings archive
Luddism and the Neo-Luddite Reaction by Martin Ryder, University of Colorado at
Denver School of Education Stand up against the anti-technology
terrorists by Gerardo Herrera Corral, Nature 476, 373
Rage Against the Machines