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1. The Industrial Revolution and its consequences have
been a disaster for the human race. They have greatly
increased the life-expectancy of those of us who live in
“advanced” countries, but they have destabilized society,
have made life unfulfilling, have subjected human beings
to indignities, have led to widespread psychological suffe-
ring (in the Third World to physical suffering as well) and
have inflicted severe damage on the natural world. The
continued development of technology will worsen the si-
tuation. It will certainly subject human being to greater in-
dignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world,
it will probably lead to greater social disruption and psy-
chological suffering, and it may lead to increased physical
suffering even in “advanced” countries.
2. The industrial-technological system may survive or it
may break down. If it survives, it MAY eventually achieve
a low level of physical and psychological suffering, but
only after passing through a long and very painful period
of adjustment and only at the cost of permanently redu-
cing human beings and many other living organisms to
engineered products and mere cogs in the social machine.
Furthermore, if the system survives, the consequences will
be inevitable: There is no way of reforming or modifying
the system so as to prevent it from depriving people of
dignity and autonomy.
3. If the system breaks down the consequences will still
be very painful. But the bigger the system grows the more
disastrous the results of its breakdown will be, so if it is
to break down it had best break down sooner rather than
later.
4. We therefore advocate a revolution against the in-
dustrial system. This revolution may or may not make use
of violence; it may be sudden or it may be a relatively
gradual process spanning a few decades. We can’t predict
any of that. But we do outline in a very general way the
measures that those who hate the industrial system should
take in order to prepare the way for a revolution against
that form of society. This is not to be a POLITICAL revo-
lution. Its object will be to overthrow not governments
but the economic and technological basis of the present
society.