- Author:
- Andrew Feenberg
The technologies, markets, and administrations of today's knowledge society are in crisis. We face recurring disasters in every domain: climate change, energy shortages, economic meltdown. The system is broken, despite everything the technocrats claim to know about science, technology, and economics. These problems are exacerbated by the fact that today powerful technologies have unforeseen effects that disrupt everyday life; the new masters of technology are not restrained by the lessons of experience, and accelerate change to the point where society is in constant turmoil. In Between Reason and Experience, leading philosopher of technology Andrew Feenberg makes a case for the interdependence of reasonscientific knowledge, technical rationalityand experience. Feenberg examines different aspects of the tangled relationship between technology and society from the perspective of critical theory of technology, an approach he has pioneered over the past twenty years. Feenberg points to two examples of democratic interventions into technology: the Internet (in which user initiative has influenced design) and the environmental movement (in which science coordinates with protest and policy). He examines methodological applications of critical theory of technology to the case of the French Minitel computing network and to the relationship between national culture and technology in Japan. Finally, Feenberg considers the philosophies of technology of Heidegger, Habermas, Latour, and Marcuse. The gradual extension of democracy into the technical sphere, Feenberg argues, is one of the great political transformations of our time. Inside Technology series
Cited By
- Jarvenpaa S and Essén A (2023). Data sustainability, Information and Organization, 33:1, Online publication date: 1-Mar-2023.
Keyes O, Hoy J and Drouhard M Human-Computer Insurrection Proceedings of the 2019 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, (1-13)- Schwartz S and Mahnke M I - Facebook - World Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Social Media and Society, (370-374)
- (2017). Till data do us part, Information and Organization, 27:4, (191-210), Online publication date: 1-Dec-2017.
- García-Peñalvo F and Kearney N Networked youth research for empowerment in digital society Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Technological Ecosystems for Enhancing Multiculturality, (3-9)
- Edwards E, Coulton P and Chiasson M Growing an interpretation ecology in a walled kitchen garden Proceedings of the 2014 companion publication on Designing interactive systems, (65-68)
Index Terms
- Between Reason and Experience: Essays in Technology and Modernity
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Reviews
David Bruce Henderson
An atypical read, this interesting, enjoyable, and difficult book discusses technology and its relation to society and politics. In fact, I haven't had to focus so hard on a text since my days at university. This collection of nine related essays draws on the work of both past philosophers and modern theorists. The book is divided into three parts, and each part consists of three chapters. Part 1 explores technology's progress in the 20th century, including its interaction with society, bureaucracy, and government. Feenberg discusses how scientific-technical rationality has dominated the adoption of technology, as well as the impact of this perspective on freedom and individuality. The rise of the environmental movement, the Internet, and other information technologies are discussed as potential liberators of a society that Feenberg equates to a "dystopia." He argues the proposition that these new forces are making decisions on technology more democratic. In Part 2, Feenberg provides an overview of his critical theory of technology. He then applies these concepts to France's Minitel-a videotex system accessible through telephone lines that was launched in the 1980s-and the relationship between culture and technical development in the modernization of Japan. The last part reviews the major themes of the book at a more philosophical level: it further explores the relationship between everyday experience and technological rationality, and it argues that the extension of democracy into the adoption of technological change is one of the great political transformations of our time. The book includes a sizable foreword, preface, and afterword; a comprehensive list of notes; references; and an adequate index. While not for the casual reader, it is an excellent book for those interested in exploring the sociological aspects of science and technology in a democratic society. Online Computing Reviews Service
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