Jacques Ellul- Prophetic or Apocalyptic Theologian of ... · PDF fileJacques Ellul-Prophetic or Apocalyptic Theologian of Technology? In Season Out of Season: An Introduction to the

Jacques Ellul-Prophetic or Apocalyptic

Theologian of Technology?*

In Season Out of Season: An Introduction to the Thought of JacquesEllul. By Jacques Ellul. Based on Interviews by MadeleineGarrigou-Lagrange. Translated by Lani K. Niles. (SanFrancisco: Harper and Row, 1982).

The natural beauty of Rio de Janeiro's coastal flatlands enclosedwithin rock mountain barriers serves as the setting of a modern

city constructed with attention to the cultural residues of Europe.The natural and cultural attractions of the city lure the people ofBrazil to the friendly bistros and gleaming beaches, the enticingrestaurants and colorful football matches, as a leisured, if notleisurely, return on hard work within a nation struggling to modern-ize. In relaxing at one of the sidewalk cafes that ring the beachfrontsof Copacabana and Leme, one might puzzle over the seemingparadox of, from above Corcovado's 2,310 foot peak, a one-hundredfoot figure of Christ the Redeemer dominating this city of leisurewith outstretched arms, until the reality of the city etches itself ontothe glare of its image: penny merchants of myriad goods stalk thebeaches amongst both the very wealthy and the very poor who sharenature's waves. Thieves of various ages cruise the sands while thedaughters of poverty struggle to survive in packs around the plush,modern high-rise hotels. Rolls Royces edge past the sub-teen shoe-shines who attempt to earn sufficient means for their families' sur-vival in stilted shacks over stagnant water. It is this reality of the citythat captures the paradoxes of modernity with which Jacques Ellulstruggles in coming to grips with modern society and technology.His answers suggest that one must look upward toward the statuethat dominates the city whenever one's gaze rises above the streets.But alas, electricity is used to flood the towering figure as it main-tains its vigilance into the night.

For many years now, Jacques Ellul has advanced the most consis-

*The author thanks the Vanderbilt University Research Council for support andScarlett Gower Graham for her criticism.

214 THE POLITICAL SCIENCE REVIEWER

tent critical analysis of the role of technology in tranforming manand society, and has been recognized, especially in the UnitedStates, as the spokesperson for human existence as it is threatened bytechnological absorption; From the appearance of John Wilkinson'stranslation of Ellul's La technique ou l'enjeu du siecle (1954) in 1964as The Technological Society, few serious discussions of technologyas a social issue have avoided attention to Ellul's rhetoric. He hasprovided the framework for discourse concerning technology bystealing the presumption of argument from those scholars who seetechnology largely as the means for improving human existence. Inthe literature, Ellul reigns supreme as the anti-technologyspokesperson, the theorist most vocal in laying bare the dehumaniz-ing aspect of progress based on the process of exploiting all availablemeans of transforming and organizing production and managementunder the , principle of efficiency. Moreover, Ellul's prescriptions-carefully constrained in his works on technology per se in order tomaximize attention to "the problem"-are now being studied by awider audience than the small circle of Protestant readers whowould have found his version of Protestant theology interesting.Social theorists of the reputation of John H. Schaar and Norman O.Brown have begun to give critical attention even to Ellul'stheological texts and prescriptions.' Thus, in analyzing the work ofEllul by placing this newest volume into the context of his corpus, itis essential that the two themes of his critical analysis be advanced.The first is the assessment of the phenomenon, technology, as itdominates modern existence. The second closely related theme is hispersonal religious prescription for dealing with this domination.These themes revolve around the modern city, which serves as therepresentation of the technological system in its full development aswell as the symbol for non-spiritual existence.

The many books of Ellul that are available in English translationcannot be adequately summarized in a single essay. In reviewing hisoverall position as very personally summarized in the interview for-mat of In Season Out of Season, one must pick and choose amongtwenty previous translations, not to mention more than a dozenbooks currently unavailable in English. 2 In this essay, therefore,

1. John H. Schaar, "Jacques Ellul: Between Babylon and the New Jerusalem,"democracy, Vol. II, no. 4 (Fall, 1982): 102-118, and Norman O. Brown, "JacquesEllin: Beyond Geneva and Jerusalem," democracy Vol. II, no. 4 (Fall, 1982): 119-126.

2. See (235-236) for current list of Ellul's books. All parenthetical page references inthe text are to In Season Out of Season.

ELLUL-THEOLOGIAN OF TECHNOLOGY 215

Ellul's critical stance on technology and his plea for the spiritual life,the "two lines of study" he consciously planned for his life work(175), serve as our guide to the "ensemble" of his works which hehimself warns cannot be treated as a source for founding a "school ofthought" (193). Let us begin, then, by placing the first theme in thecontext of the literature.

`Technology' and Political Theory Before and After Jacques Ellul

When classical political philosophers introduced the criticalassessment of the social and political consequences of technē, theyraised concern over problems of technology at the very beginning ofthe Western political tradition. Their recognition that technē wasneutral in the sense that it must be guided by human ends, but thatadvances in technique introduce new potential ends, led them toworry about the control of technological innovations in society. AsLeo Strauss put the point, "The classics demanded the strict moral-political supervision of inventions; the good and wise city will deter-mine which inventions are to be made use of and which are to besuppressed." 3 Technē was viewed as artifact, as humanly createdmeans to an end, and therefore properly to be subjected toevaluative standards before particular technological innovationsand inventions are adopted within a society. To be sure, even Platorecognized the positive potential of technological improvements, atleast to the extent that he knew that the public would desire im-provements. After acknowledging Plato's conservative positiontoward forces of change, Mulford Q. Sibley writes:

Yet the inevitability of social change in the existential world is recognized, forone of the functions of the Nocturnal Council is to send clever men abroad togather suggestions for collective changes-including new technology-whichcan be introduced gradually and rationally.*

From the beginning, then, Western political thought has recognizedthe potential conflict between the desire for the fruits of improvedtechnology and the possible costs of unthinking adoption of newtechniques.

The key to the classical position on technology is the commitment

3. Thoughts on Machiavelli (New York: The Free Press, 1959), 298.4. Technology and Utopian Thought (Minneapolis, Minn.: Burgess Publishing Co.,

1972), 13.


to human control of innovations in technē through deliberativereason. The problem that had to be overcome was, for the classicaltheorist, thoughtlessness in political-social choice, not the removalof technē per se. The experience and results of applying new tech-niques to the procedures of production could well lead to im-provements in methods that also carry negative consequences. It isthe latter unanticipated consequences that the classical theoristswished to control by rational assessments. This is the recurrent ten-sion found in various warnings about technology as diverse as thoseof Plato and Alexander Pope. Readings of Plato's utopia in theRepublic that assert he supports a no-growth recommendation failto take into account the fact that the point of the text was todemonstrate the potential consequences of thoughtless or unthinkingacceptance of uncontrolled change. Plato could see in his ownculture that technology affected society and man. Thus, the"modern" problem of technology is not so modern after all. It israther a recurrent problem of balancing man's capacity to developmeans of controlling and restructuring physical nature againstcareful assessment of the proper values and purposes to be imposedas limits-humane limits-on that potentiality. The primary task inunderstanding technology is to grasp the phenomenon comprehen-sively and precisely enough with our theory so that we can betterunderstand the normative and empirical consequences associatedwith technē and its changes.

Although the problem of social and political assessment oftechnology has long been part of social research, the problem oftechnology seems more central in current thinking; in part becauseof Ellul's writings. Perhaps this currency has increased because ofthe omnipresence of machines and computers, or because of ourawareness of such phenomena as organizational growth or theknowledge explosion. The increased sensitivity may be based on thefact that new techniques now are being developed more directly outof scientific discoveries rather than serendipitously occurring asJerome B. Wiesner characterized the advances that led to the in-dustrial revolution, as acts of "practical men and based upon art,observation and common sense." 5 It is not necessary to resolve fullywhether the definitions of technology have recently shifted in anessential way in order to recognize that its classical definingcharacteristics have remained stable. Techne, or the means for con-

5. Where Sciēnce and Politics Meet (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1961), 31.


trolling, developing, and restructuring nature, is generally the samesort of thing if applied to carving marble in Attica as it is if appliedto building a space shuttle. It is nonetheless important to explorewhether the scope and procedures that have evolved permit a betterunderstanding of `technique' and `technology' so as to improve ourunderstanding and thinking about the phenomenon. It is this ques-tion of enlarged scope and impact of technology wherein JacquesEllul's explication of technique and technology are important forassessing the range of problems and issues that currently attract mostof our attention in evaluating the subject. Then, particulartreatments in the field of technology studies that are relevant to sort-ing through these issues and problems can be briefly explored inassessing Ellul's arguments.

Ellul's discussions of `technology' and `technique' provide perhapsthe most comprehensive overview of the problems associated withthe phenomenon. His many definitions and usages give one more ageneral conception than a precise concept of `technology' because heattempts to focus our thinking on the emergent qualities oftechnology within society. Although he himself in a footnote callsMax Weber's formal definition the "first satisfactory" one, it is in-structive to introduce it as a contrast with Ellul's own efforts inorder to see the different concerns guiding their analyses. Webersays:

The term 'technology' applied to an action refers to the totality of meansemployed as opposed to the meaning or end to which the action is, in the lastanalysis, oriented. Rational technique is a choice of means which is consciouslyand systematically oriented to the experience and reflection of the actor, whichconsists, at the highest level of rationality, in scientific knowledge. What is con-cretely to be treated as a 'technology' is thus variable.°

Weber is serious about the range of applicability of the term becausehe sees it applying to activities as various as the techniques of loveand war, prayer and legal decisions, painting and sculpture. "All ofthese are capable of the widest variation in degree of rationality.The presence of a `technical question' always means that there is

8. The Theory of Social and Economic Organization, trans. A. M. Henderson andTalcott Parsons (New York: The Free Press, 1964), 100-101. Ellul cites this passage,though his translation is significantly different (see especially the lack of 'totality' in hisreading of Weber) in the first footnote to Ch. 2 (at 330) of The Technological System,trans. Joachim Neugroschel (New York: Continuum, 1980).


some doubt over the choice of the most efficient means to an end."Weber gives rather precise and unambiguous meaning to the termwhile recognizing the applicability would be wide-ranging. Ellul'sconception is looser and less neutral than Weber's concept.

The "Note to the Reader" in his Technological Society introducesEllul's special view of his subject.

The term technique, as I use it, does not mean machines, technology, or this orthat procedure for attaining an end. In our technological society, technique isthe totality of methods rationally arrived at and having absolute efficiency (fora given stage of development) in every field of human activity. Itscharacteristics are new; the technique of the present has no common measurewith that of the past e

The first obvious difference between Weber and Ellul comes notfrom the terms `technology' and 'technique'-problems ofetymology are discussed below-but from the totality of means to anaction (Weber) and totality of all social means (Ellul). This dif-ference is especially noticeable in conjunction with Weber's attemptto define for all contexts and Ellul's claim that each context issomehow without common measure with other contexts, thusleading to a new definition of `technique' for our "technologicalsociety." (One suspects a difference in purposes guiding their respec-tive techniques of definition, and that Ellul's elusiveness may be themost efficient means to his end.) Ellul's definition and his opinednovelty of the characteristics he isolates provide a summation notonly of the book it introduces, but also of his many works on theoverall theme of technology. Not only does `technique' refer to thetotality of efficient, rational human, innovations, Ellul also treats

_ this totality as a holistic phenomenon. The definition's definingcharacteristics identify what technique is; the treatment introducesan accompanying characteristic of a Weltanschauung that is poten-tially an insidious and pernicious determinant of social action. Theaccompanying characteristic is what Ellul sees as a new force to bereckoned with by societies. Indeed, "technique," in Ellul's summaryinterview responses, is "the fundamental element of society" displac-ing Marx's 19th century economic determinism (175-176).

The collection of individual techniques is not the force that

7. Weber, 101.8. Trans. John Wilkinson (New York: Vintage Books, 1964), xxv. This book was

originally published in French in 1954.


dominates man according to Ellul. Together, techniques are a reser-voir of means that independently could be treated under Weber'sdefinition. What he attempts to show under promises of beingneutral toward his subject is that the totality of techniques has theadditional characteristics of totality as such; that is, technique hasbecome so dominant as to impose a structure on all human action,including politics.° "Nothing can lay claim to action; it is actedupon by technological process. Nothing can regard itself asautonomous; it is the technological system that is autonomous...."1° This mode of analysis transforms the accompanyingcharacteristic of Ellul's definition-totality-into the definingcharacteristic (no surprise at all if seen in the context of all of hisbooks) which in turn does permit him to raise some very seriousquestions about technique for political theorists, but the tautologicaltrickery of incorporating an accompanying characteristic into thedefinition prevents anyone from answering the questions fromwithin the structure of his arguments. Thus Ellul's statements do notpermit specification of technique as a concept (which can be treateddefinitionally and placed into testable hypotheses about its conse-quences) separate from the theoretical claims themselves. The merg-ing of the thing and its consequences leads to an holistic view. ThatEllul merges concept and theory is best shown by example:

Technique is not an isolated fact in society (as the term technology would leadus to believe) but it is related to every factor in the life of modern man; it affectssocial facts as well as all others. Thus technique itself is a sociologicalphenomenon, and it is in this light that we shall study it."

This interest in how technique relates to individual and social ac-tion is the central one for many political theorists. What Ellul maymiss by his failure to distinguish definitional and theoretical dif-ferences is the guidance from classical and modern theorists he sooften labels as empty. The rise of classical philosophy was to a greatextent based on the refusal of Socrates to ignore the impact of scienceand artifact upon man. The Socratic turn, so well isolated in Francis

9. On the very negative political implications seen by Ellul, see both The Political Il-lusion, trans. Konrad Kellen (New York: Vintage Books, 1972) and Propaganda: TheFormation of Men's Attitudes, trans. Konrad Kellen and Jean Komer (New York: Vin-tage Books, 1973).

10. Technological System, 12.11. Technological Society, xxvi.


McDonald Cornford's Before and After Socrates, 12 places the humanconsequences for man as the proper starting point in assessingscience and technology, thus introducing politics as properly in con-trol of technē in its application. Though Ellul raises many importantissues, questions, and problems, his definitions, because they mergeconcept and theory, remove what the Western tradition has treatedas the proper means for resolving these very issues, questions, andproblems. The important distinction between technicians and politi-cians, recognized in Robert K. Merton's foreword to TheTechnological Society,

13provides the key to Ellul's lock. The only

means of controlling modern technology, with its seeminglyautonomous laws of growth, is politics; but then, that was also trueof pre-modern technique as well.

The distinction between `technology' and `technique' is more dif-ficult to draw in English and German than in French because in theformer `technology' is often used to mean "technique" as well as"technology", just as the German word `Technik' can mean eitherEnglish term." Roughly following the Greek distinction, `technique'is the "means for action," while `technology' is the "science or theoryof techniques. As Ellul relates:

Originally . . . 'technique' ... consistent with its etymology, meant a certainmanner of doing something, a process or ensemble of processes. Diderot thusspeaks of the "technique proper to each painter." But rapidly, as machine andits industrial application came to dominate, `technique' (and then `technology'in English) began to designate the processes of constructing and exploitingmachines. People now more frequently employ the plural. These were thenstudied by a science called technologie.. . . This science consists in describingand analyzing these techniques, . . . in tracing their history and investigatingways of improving them. 15

This distinction permits Ellul to isolate common features oftechnology and he specifies the "overriding feature since its origin:efficiency. People could now say that technology was the ensemble

12. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1932).13. Technological Society, 10.14. See translator's note, 106, of Weber. The etymological roots of the terms ap-

parently are not reversed from the Greek in Romanian usages, but are in specializedusage in the field of technology assessment: see Daniela Rusa, "Terminology forTechnology Assessment," paper at the 1982 I.P.S.A. Congress, Rio de Janeiro, where"Tekhnikos, tekhne = art, skill, mental and practical ability " and"Tekhnologia = treatise or discourse on the arts" are defined.

15. Technological System, 24.


of the absolutely most efficient means at a given moment."16

Ellulthus gets back to Weber's definition of `technology' with the ad-dition of "absolutely most efficient" added to "means," thereby add-ing an animism to the means: inefficient means at any moment fallout of the class `technology'.

Ellul's premises of definition become less opaque as he introduceshis view that technology is more than an instrument. Ellul seestechniques as instruments with the added thrust that the in-struments are means that mediate between nature and man. He seesgrowth in the quantity of mediations having qualitatively changedinto a technological object." This mode of mediation replaces allother human bonds from the arts, magic, myth and symbols. Thus,the technological object prefigures all other relations, all means tohuman ends. According to Ellul, this qualitative shift was more thanadditive: `By combining and universalizing, observers had nowgiven it a kind of autonomy and specificity." 18 This emergent qualityhe uncovers, however, was hidden in his definition all along,awaiting release by tautological assessments. One can be convincedthat the increased role of technology raises problems deserving ofassessment without presuming that at some state "more" releases agenie from a bottle. By failing to state and test the obvious assertionsabout the consequences of size of technological growth, Ellul con-structs his conclusion within his definition: a technological society isone dominated by a technological system; a technological system"fashions society in terms of its necessities" although only as its"determining factor" because the technological system is not the on-ly factor. 19 All he needs to do then is persuade any modern societyand its members that it is a case of a technological society, and thestage is set for acceptance of Ellul's prescriptions. This prefiguring ofthe problems of technological assessments by the macro-analyticsociological stance should perhaps receive some praise because itmakes very clear that the assessment of technology may require dif-ferent concepts and theories at different levels of analysis because ofits potentially negative accompanying characteristics of un-constrained growth. 20 But research based on less encompassing

16. Technological System, 261.17. Technological System, 34.18. Technological System, 27.19. Technological System; 18.20. Technological Society, xxix.


definitions allows for careful assessment as to whether the "accom-panying characteristics" always are present, and why. This simpledefinitional correction neutralizes not only the prefiguredsociological claims about man in technological society, it also leadstoward ways of testing them. Most important, it frees our theoryfrom the pervasive fatalism that suggests that modern man issubmerged by a technological determinism unless and until (a) wekill each other off in war, (b) God decides to intervene, or (c) we aretransformed by a spiritual revolt (perhaps stimulated by Ellul'stheological works?). 21 We can check Ellul's gloom only if we in-troduce the possibility-the classical possibility-of humanly con-trolling technology through politics. On the other hand, Ellul'sworks are important because they rivet attention on problems thatmust be studied, albeit by more rigorous methods, in research on therelations between technology and society.

The Consequences of the Technological Society:Technology, Man, Freedom, and Politics

The characteristic of the technological society that troubles Ellulthe most as he reviews his work in sociology and theology seems to bethe logic of the world that systematizes and orders the social ex-istence; Ellul argues that he himself is in self-contradiction on theproblem of order:

Here again I am in complete contradiction with myself. By preference I am aman of order. I like everything to unfold without a hitch, for my day's scheduleto be precisely planned. I am unhappy in disorder. . . . But I cannot tolerate ex-ternal and formal order.... order is born from disorder, and imbalances aloneare creative. Freedom, too, is never established once and for all; it has to bereconquered, lost, and gambled for again. So I would not say that I am a manof order but rather a man who believes in the necessity of a constantly renewedaction (222).

21. Technological Society, xxx. The literature that is important in coming to gripswith Ellul's purposes can best be explored in The Meaning of the City, trans. DennisPardee (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1970); ThePolitics of God and the Politics of Man, trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids,Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1972); and The Ethics of Freedom,trans. Geoffrey W. Bromiley (Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdman's PublishingCo., 1976).


Were it not that Ellul's theology is individualistic, thus removing thepositive role of community, one could see a serious connection withthe ideas of P.J. Proudhon when Ellul says that Christianity"prevents society from locking itself into a finished system"(221-222). Ossification and fixation, those side-products of stan-dardization, are for Ellul "not only the supreme evil, but the evil: itis paralysis, entropy, repetition, identicalness, unity, duplication "

(223). Unfortunately, Ellul's model of freedom in diversityresembles more a solipsistic anarchism than a humanitarian one; itattacks society's order rather than suggesting a communitarianorder.

The attack on technology is essentially an attack on the world.Ellul sees the human condition as a drama:

God does not want to rule everything; the world is extraordinarily uncertain,dominated as it is by sin. But within this world are at work grace, the covenant,and the promise. God does not reject his creation, but his relationship with it isone of tension, of conflict, and of pardon (204).

This "rethinking" of the Protestant line removes, for Ellul, God asthe source for his attack on Technique: the source is sin, the sin ofthe city. The questioning of technology can therefore be broached asan attack on human weaknesses, as it were, that are the conse-quences of our wickedness; one denies not God's order in challeng-ing the technological one. It is a search for an answer to the questionof whether there exists an alternative to the logic of technology, "canthere be an evolution that would not be the absorption of all society,the molding of man and society by Technique?" (205) Afterdiscounting the cultures of the Third World, human nature,mankind, and nature as potential dialectic oppositions to Technique(205-207), Ellul settles on the theological solution (207-208). Not.on-ly is God not the source of the technological society, God provides itsonly potential opponent. Man's freedom is simply found in followingthe Word in the midst of the technological society.

The dialectical opposition of religion, for Ellul, can be seen insmall openings of a deepening of faith in negative contexts such asscientists becoming acquainted with the God-hypothesis and com-mitted Christians in Russia (211), but it will not be a major interven-tion because we are in "a period in which God is silent" (210). Thishope that is generated by small openings is based on faith in humanintermediaries acting for God, but must be much less expansive than


which he possessed in his earlier efforts to transform the ReformedChurch of France (84-97). Indeed, all of Ellul's efforts at organiza-tion and working within institutions seemed to lead to negative ex-periences: these negative experiences no doubt affected his thinkingabout organization and the problems of technological society.

One of the most instructive reminiscences by Ellul deals with hisearly experiences in politics. In the 1930s, in collaboration with Ber-nard Charbonneau, Ellul organized small, revolutionary groups asan option to the ordinary conceptions of political parties by otherMarxists (38-44). The efforts for concrete action of this sort did notreceive institutional support. The connection with the groups brokewhen Ellul took the Professorship at Strasbourg in 1938, and thegroups disappeared with the war. The young Marxist professor withanarchist, anti-nationalist tendencies was fired by the Vichy govern-ment two years after his assumption of the position, thus giving him"no other way to act" than joining the Resistance (47). The fact thathe was in the resistance group of the Gironde region led to his inclu-sion in the post-war liberation city council of Bordeaux. A briefeighteen months of experience greatly affected Ellul's views ofpolitics and its potential for action.

Though the longevity of it was less than two years Ellul believesthat,

in retrospect it was very important. Basically, this experience determined manyof my later political and administrative analyses. I learned how little room foraction a politician has and how heavy the administration is. And this was thecase even during a troubled period, when from all appearances we were start-ing almost from scratch and the old structures were open to question. So that iswhere I learned, for example, how incredibly dependent we are on ad-ministrative departments (53).

This brief exposure was translated into a truism about political con-trol: Ellul had to trust department heads for technical informationrather than his own rational evaluations, thus. convincing himselfthat a technocracy, ultimately uncontrollable by a democracy, mustemerge (54) . Because of the importance of the antipolitical stance inall of his major works, his words on the experience are worth exten-sive reflection:

We arrived on the scene like choirboys with our sincerity, our certainties, andour revolutionary intransigence. And we found ourselves in company with someseasoned old foxes who knew how to conduct a political meeting and how toblock it. The political networks were immediately reformed. Dating from this

225ELLUL-THEOLOGIAN OF TECHNOLOGY

defeat and these manipulations, I developed a mistrust and even a hatred forpolitical circles. I'm not just talking about the political ruling class but about thelower levels-the section and committee leaders on the local level (56).

The negative practical experience was very important in structur-ing Ellul's later thought. Though his investigation of propaganda ina modern, technological society is a valuable study in themechanization of political language corroborating Orwellian fearsof transforming the individual and public opinion, and his study ofillusion makes clearer how technology transforms politics itself(176), the explanation of the fatalism within these political works isfound not so much in the political system studied by sociologicaltechniques as it is a projection of early political disappointmentsprojected onto the studies.

22No psychoanalytic argument is

necessary because Ellul explains his loss of illusions and his"definitive" break with politics in these words:

Try to understand me. I had seen the failure of the Popular Front in 1936; thefailure of the personalist movement, which we intended to be revolutionary andwhich we tried to start on a modest scale; the failure of the Spanish revolution,which had great importance for Charbonneau and me; and the failure of theliberation. All of this formed an accumulation of ruined revolutionarypossibilities. After this, I never believed anything could be changed by this route(56)

The move from revolution to revelation was too complete becausethe possibility of politics never was fairly explored. The youngprophet of transformation was ineffectual, perhaps because he wastrained with a transformational rather than a political sense. Themove from Marxism to Protestantism and technocriticism was not sofar as it might seem: a complete system of thought based oneconomic determinism was replaced by a two-part system thatmaintained a sociologically-determined closed system perspective(technocriticism) with the solace of a human dimension for the in-dividual in Protestant theology. Ellul needed a sense of the politicalin his new package of beliefs no more than he did as a transforma-tional revolutionary. The difference is that Marx's apocalypse isdisplaced by a grander scheme. The human actors, who may fail to

22. The conclusion of The Political Illusion seems to leave all hope destroyed exceptfor the slim possibility of conversion: the fact that planning and efficiency are part ofdemocratic survival transforms democracy into illusion. If the arguments were struc-tured to permit hope and openness to multiple modes of conversion, the books wouldnot seem so bleak.


respond to a prophet, cannot affect his theories. So much forpolitical resolution of the problems of a technological society!

For Ellul, we have already noted, human nature and nature failto provide models for limiting the growth of the behemoth,technology. The force of his sociology is to show that technologypermeates all human activities and prepares us through education tofeel at home, so to speak, in the technological system. He presumesthat all semblance of the arational, experiential aspects of humanexistence are controlled by Technique. What he does not do is dealwith community or the human values experienced and brought toconsciousness through reflection in those settings. Though he wor-ries that technicians ignore the philosophers of technology, "whoseonly audience is within the circle of philosophers and humanists," hefails to explore whether the reason the technicians close their ears isa lack of willingness to hear because the technological system isautonomous (Ellul's claim) or because the philosophers speaknonsense in their own technical language which is unrelated tohuman experiences. 20 Without a serious grasp of human nature,nature, and consciousness, one puzzles over what it is that aphilosopher might say. Except for the theological solution, there isno serious exploration of consciousness except in the negative discus-sions of how the technological society insinuates itself into eachman's consciousness. For Ellul, this is enough. For a non-revolutionary political theory, unfortunately, it is not.

Human freedom and choice are therefore limited to following thetheological solution. Ellul saw the Ethics of Freedom 24 as thecounterpoint to his studies on technology (183). The freedom he seesis the choice of following God's commandments as promises ratherthan as imperatives: "A path is opened up before you. God is he who

23. The Technological System, 145. Much of philosophy has become technique, buteven so, the assessments provided-if they are to be of value in political choice-mustbe written in a fashion that permits their use in serious political deliberation.

24. This book is the best of the many theological texts for comprehending Ellul's useof the Word to unsettle "the evil" of order: "to sum up, I do not think the true issue is,as it was thought a long time, that of entering an order (of life and the world) which iswilled by God as it is, and of staying within this order by vocation. The point is ratherthat we enter a disorder which, even though it seems to be ordered, has in fact beenshut up by man, so that moment we try to express our vocation in it we upset thingsand call them in question." This sounds revolutionary, but he immediately concludes:"When all has been said, nothing has been said, nothing has been done. Yet all hasbeen done, for who can go beyond the Word?" (510).


continually frees us from all that hinders" (80). Ellul sees freedom

... at the center of my whole life and whole work. Nothing I have done, ex-perienced, or thought makes sense if it is not considered in the light of freedom.This is so, first, because the God revealed in the Bible is above all the liberator.He creates for freedom. And when men break their relation with him, Godrespects this act of independence. The only problem is not the metaphysicalquestion of freedom but how to be assured that we are liberated by God in JesusChrist, and how to live this freedom. Hence an ethic of freedom (183-184).

One can properly decide to be a disrupter of the social logic byfollowing this ethic of freedom, but the despair over political corn-munitarian activities he also sees prevents any pursuit of sharedfreedoms in society-they, of course, are but illusions. We are freeto save ourselves, but not the city.

What Can We Do to Improve on Ellul in Political Research?

The model of the technological society, and now system, in Ellul'sworks remains unchanged in this most recent effort, though hepromises to dramatize a bit less than he did in The TechnologicalSociety because he thinks people now are "without hope",(223-224).The technological society has, with its integrated subsystems,become the evil of contemporary existence. Had the prophet thehope that he could destroy the system's inner logic, he no doubtwould. He is, for good or evil, the prophet unarmed. As we explorehis thought, we can isolate many negative consequences of un-constrained technological growth. Unfortunately for applying histhoughts about technology through action, we confront the fact thathe presents little more than an either/or confrontation even thoughhe has a maxim, "Think globally, act locally" (199). He wants nocase by case assessment of technologies, which would be, of course,the necessary prerequisite for serious political analysis. Because it isimpossible to imagine social rejection of technology per se, thedevelopment of an understanding of the subject must go beyond thecaricature sketched by Ellul, guided by the questions he suggests.

Following Ellul, it is appropriate to ask whether the phenomenonhas shifted qualitatively in recent years to become somethinggenerically different. If so, what has changed? The scope and depthof applicability of technology has greatly increased in advancedsocieties. And indeed, the productive structures are viewed as post-industrial. Electronics rather than mechanics composes the heart of


most current technological innovations, with "knowledge" of allsorts--not just the knowledge of "the physicists, the chemists and theengineers"--driving the modern economy. 25 The forces behind thesechanges are likely; as Emmanuel Mesthene points out, economic in-terests pushing toward improvements.

28The changing forms of

technological advance, however, remain aligned with Frederick W.Taylor's principle: "one best way to do a job."2 7 What is different isfound in the source of the innovation. As Kenneth E. Boulding labelsit, "folk technology" was replaced by "science-based technology"starting in about 1850. 28 The difference in how the source can becharacterized before and after is captured in Francis Bacon'saphorism:

The study of nature with a view to works is engaged in by the mechanic, themathematician, the physician, the alchemist, and the magician; but by all (asthings now are) with slight endeavor and scanty success.'

The "after" picture entailed in Bacon's obvious hope is powerfullyarticulated by Weisner in Where Science and Politics Meet:

I am intrigued by the analogy between biological evolution and the presenthuman enterprise. There are two special ways in which the similarities showup: in the evolving and progressively more sophisticated technology that is ap-plied to the solution of problems and in the growing size and complexity of thehuman organizations which are being created to deal with business and socialproblems. In these man has found a speedy substitute for continued biologicalevolution to aid him in the hardships of the environment.' 0

Shift there has been. The change is not in the meaning oftechnology, but in the sources of technological growth.

This shift does not necessarily mean that all of the negativeemergent qualities Ellul fears inevitably must arise. Technology hasalways been able to cause social change. Long ago George Unwin

25.Peter F. Drucker, The Age ofDiscontinuity: Guidelines to Our Changing Socie-ty (New York: Harper Colophon Books, 1978), 265-286.

26. Technological Change (New York: New American Library, 1970).27. David E. Whisnant, "The Craftsman: Some Reflections on Work in America,"

Technology as Institutionally Related to Human Values, ed. Philip C. Ritterbrush( Washington D.C.: Acropolis Books, L.T.D., 1974), 111.

28. Ecodynamics: A New Theory of Social Evolution (Beverly Hills and London:Sage Publications, 1978), 29.

29. The New Organon, I.v.30. Where Science and Politics Meet, 23.


recognized "No Act of Parliament could permanently restrain theforces making for a fundamental redistribution of economic func-tions, and for the establishment of a freer, but more complex andmore divergent, system of social relations. "31 Indeed, Karl W.Deutsch, who sees society as commencing from a "group of in-dividuals" united by a division of labor, saw that technology canand does affect social structure, but that social patterns, such as"chattel slavery" can, in reverse, affect the growth of technology.

32

What the newer pace of innovation in technology means is thatproblems can be generated more rapidly than societies are currentlystructured to evaluate and control them, thus permitting those in-terests supporting change for economic or other reasons an enhancedchance to innovate before social or political assessments can bemade. In contemporary context, societies can through legislationdecide how much study of unanticipated consequences must be pur-sued before freeing, say, drug technology. Pressures for cures (andprofits) will weigh against any slowdown in innovation, butcounter-arguments, also heavily structured froni -a science-technology base, may be important enough for governments andpublics to respond with constraints. Wiesner's evolutionary analogycan be expanded with "political selection" introduced as a processcorresponding with evolution's "natural selection." "Technical im-peratives," as noted by David Nobel, "define only what is possible,

not what is necessary; what can be done, not what must be done.The latter decisions are social in nature." 33 The problem is in theneed for better recognition of poor social-political adaptation ratherthan too much technological capacity.

The politics of science and technology have become subjects ofresearch, especially in the fields of science policy and technologyassessment. The relations between growth and constraint by publicpolicy are subject to research, but only if one avoids the generality ofEllul's level of analysis. Governments not only can limit the develop-ment and applications of particular technologies, they can stimulate

31. Industrial Organization in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Oxford:Clarendon Press, 1904), 140.

32. Nationalism and Social Communication: An Inquiry into the Foundations ofNationality (Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press, 1953), 29-30.

33. Quoted from America by Design (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1977) by ColinNorman, The God that Limps: Science and Technology in the Eighties (New York:W.W. Norton, 1981), 25.


the growth of technology in the modern context by supporting "puresciences" which can be later translated into technology. 34 Almostevery example of research in this field, however, requires attentionto particular techniques and the consequences of their usages, notthe holistic conception of technology in Ellul's sense. The importantdistinctions must be made, therefore, once the substance of a par-ticular area is known. Discussion of one field of possibletechnological growth requires expertise in the possibilities and con-sequences of that technology, as is well illustrated in the field ofgenetics research. 35

In social research, then, it seems the distinctions amongtechnologies must depend upon the research problem being ap-proached. And the problems may require concern over totality as anaccompanying characteristic if we wish to explore the impact oftechnology on social and/or individual belief structures in consider-ing the effects of rationalism from technological impulses upon thetraditional cultures of societies, or in considering the adaptation ofnew elites into developing societies. 3B But the concern over the prob-lem of totality requires that we study other social elements in rela-tion to `technology' and its social institutions in order to see whetherproblems change or whether applications simply vary. The politicsof technology seem no different in kind in ancient Athens andmodern states.

The patterns of technological growth, though stimulated by sociallevel interests, arise from particular organizations. The in-novations arise from the periphery. This is to be expected becauseeven science-based technology arises from collections of specialistswho are united as a profession with "its own characteristic constella-tion of ideals and ambitions, to which anyone who takes it up as a

34. On politics and government stimulated creation of technology, see Don K. Price,Government and Science (New York: New York University Press, 1954); J. S. Dupreand S. A. Lakoff, Science and the Nation (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall,1962); and Avery Leiserson, "Scientists and the Policy Process, " American PoliticalScience Review, LIX, no. 2 (June, 1965): 408-416.

35. The role of substance as precondition for technology assessment is seen in RobertH. Blank, The Political Implications of Human Genetic Technology (Boulder, Col-orado: Westview Press, 1981).

36. See for example David Apter's "Notes for a Theory of Non-DemocraticRepresentation," reprinted from NOMOS X in Some Conceptual Approaches to theStudy of Modernization (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1968), 295-328.

231ELLUL-THEOLOGIAN OF TECHNOLOGY

professional career thereby commits himself." 37 The difference be-tween a scientific community per se and a technological one is thatin a scientific community work is judged by the profession itselfwhereas technology is additionally judged by external demands(e.g., the potential in the economy and possibly negative side ef-fects). Technical fields, including even law, are, according toToulmin, subject to rational development and grow in a fashionparallel to the sciences as they attempt "to serve common humanneeds for more effective and useful goods or materials, equipment orservices."38 But these advancing communities lead to technical or-thodoxies that can be seen as the Balkanization of culture, dividingand replacing more traditional standards for production or replac-ing technical freedom from the external constraints from nature andgovernment with self-imposed professional constraints."Technological professions are thus constrained by two kinds oflimits: professional, technical constraints and social, economic andpolitical constraints. The former are particular group-individuallimits; the latter societal-systemic limits. These latter are the impor-tant and proper political limits that Ellul's either/or attitude denies.

Advances in technology do, of course, shift the societal, systemicstructures. 40 The impact is put well by David S. Landes:

. two things remain and characterize any modern industrial system: the ra-tionality, which is the spirit of the institution, and change, which is rationality'slogical corollary, for the appropriation of means to ends that is the essence of ra-tionality implies a process of continuous adaptation. These fundamentalcharacteristics have had in turn explicit consequences for the values and struc-ture of the economy and society, consequences that center in the principle ofselection by achievement. . . . industrialization is, in short, a universal solvent,and its effects are the more drastic the greater the contrast between the oldorder and the new. 4'

37. Stephen Edelston Toulmin, Human Understanding, Vol I, The Collective Useand Evolution of Concepts (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1972), 382.

38. Human Understanding, 364-367.39. The recognition that new technologies and inventions are important as social

cause is captured by the statement: "Culture, in a word, had been Balkanized; and inthe process it had been bureaucratized as well." Allan Janek and Stephen Toulmin,Wittgenstein 's Vienna (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1973), 249.

40. Langdon Winner, Autonomous Technology (Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press,1974).

41. The Unbound Prometheus: Technological Change and Industrial Developmentin Western Europe from 1750 to the Present (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,1972), 546.


The study of the impact of technology, however, must be carefullybased upon the differences among the societies: that is, the "univer-sal solvent" affects advanced and developing societies differentlyand these differences are lost if the focus of analysis remains onemergent rather than visible dimensions. It is true, as Wiesner pointsout, that transition through previous eras of technologies is not re-quired for use of new means, and the common base of science sug -

gested technology works to help a country to "join the parade . .well along the line of march." 42 Nonetheless, we must also recognizethat, because science and technology are separable with the latter'sbeing exportable, "technology," in the words of Kalman H. Silvert," is a human universal to be found under any social conditions.

"43

The importance of dividing in order to conquer the study of`technology' is evidenced by what is known about political, socialand economic development. Rationalistic, efficiency-orientedtechnological sub-communities may exist side-by-side with oldermodes of technology, and even traditional means for controllingnature side-by-side with the use of magic. The problems entailed ina society of this sort are different from, though no less important instudying `technology' than, those of an advanced industrial societybeing transformed technically by the computer chip. There is ananalogy between advanced scientific-based technology and evenrudimentary social practices that is obvious in Sigmund Freud'sstatement: The technique of animism, magic, reveals in the clearestand most unmistakable way an intention to impose the laws govern-ing mental life upon real things." 44 The contexts within whichtechnologies advance, and the theories to explain them, require carein distinguishing folk and science-based technologies and how theseinterrelate in societies that are at different levels of economicdevelopment.

An interesting subfield is emerging that deals with the value-change consequences of technological growth. At one level, on

42. Where Science and Politics Meet, 142.43, "Conclusions," The. Social Reality of Scientific Myth: Science and Social

Change, ed. Kalman H. Silvert (New York: American University's Field Staff, Inc.,1969), 228.

44. Totem and Taboo (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul), 91. See Fred W. Riggs,"'Technology', A Developmental Perspective," 1982 I.P.S.A. Congress, Rio de Janeiro,on the side-by-side technologies. For a contrast with Ellul on the threat to religion,etc., see Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Science and Christ, trans. Rene Hague (NewYork: Harper and Row, 1985), 205.


Ellul's level of analysis, theorists such as Herbert Marcuse see thenorms of efficiency, rationalism, and material success cutting offhuman concern about other types of values. 45 The same problem isarticulated by E. F. Schumacher, but with the desire to turn ourhuman interests toward non-Cartesian thinking. 46 The problem canbe articulated by many metaphors, and Loren C. Eiseley is ar-ticulate:

The human form, originally so variable, has been narrowed into one new chan-nel whose primary emphasis involves the rise and development of the humancortex. An enormous spectrum of possible behavior, or possible adaptation, aspectrum so broad that it clashes and contradicts, is the product of thatbrain.... One of the things that troubles us now is that in this great whirlpoolof modern civilization, the centrifugal power, represented by modern scienceand technology, Western man is sweeping away all other societies."

All of these kinds of statements, though important warnings aboutwhat to study and what unanticipated consequences might arise,provide little in the way of improving theoretical knowledge abouttechnology and society. Just as Victor C. Ferkiss can warn oflinkages of liberal society serving technology and economic powerrelations,48 or Richard J. Bernstein can warn us against missing thedistinction of Marx between technology and class control overtechnology as the source of alienation, 4B these works point to prob-lems that require the development of less sweeping pronouncementsand more research designs to answer the underlying questions.

To move from the lofty sphere of general interpretations to thepolitical problem of technology assessment, the need to forecast re-quires a framework for projection that incorporates both theautonomy and the control possibilities of technology. The questionsto be answered concern the limits on human autonomy by context

45. One-Dimensional Man (Boston: Beacon Press, 1964).46. Theoretically, A Guide for the Perplexed (New York: Harper and Row, 1977) is

superior to either Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered (New York:Harper and Row, 1977) or Good Work (New York: Harper and Row, 1979).

47. "Alternatives to Technology," The Environment of Change, eds, Aaron W.Warner, Dean Morse, and Thomas E. Cooney (New York: Columbia University Press,1969), 171.

48. Victor Ferkiss, The Future of Technological Civilization (New York: GeorgeBraziller, 1974), 29. See also his Technological Man: The Myth and the Reality (NewYork: George Braziller, 1969).

49. Praxis and Action: Contemporary Philosophies of Human Activity(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1971), 49.


(knowledge about possible social, economic, and political conse-quences), the limits on autonomy by content (knowledge relevant totechnological possibilities), and the limits on autonomy set by con-flict (knowledge of power relations affecting political choice). 50 In-deed, much of the concern over the autonomy of technologicalgrowth is offset by recognizing how well organized are those whofear what technological growth seems to have become. Considerthat The Club of Rome volume, The Limits to Growth, has over ahalf million English copies in print with a total two million copiesavailable in thirty languages; that Solar Age has a 40,000 circula-tion, and a lobby of 30,000 members; that 10,000 to 15,000 en-vironmental groups exist in the United States with 15,000 more inWest Germany; and that the Unites States' "Friends of the Earth"group now has twenty-three international affiliates including ElSalvador and Thailand. s' These facts indicate shifts in the context,content, and conflict bases for technology assessment; that is,technology assessment decisions must account for the changinglevels at which decisions to limit are made and at which conse-quences are evaluated (context shifts among subnational, nationaland international and among individual, group and societalfactors), for the changing technical possibilities and newlydiscovered consequences (content shifts), and for the changingbalances of influences in the decision processes (conflict generatedby new groups or groups newly aware of consequences). It is thiscomplex of changing aspects that social science must master intechnology studies.

What Can We Do to Improve on Ellul in Normative Analysis?

Ellul's assessments of technology are most valuable heuristically:his arguments serve to counter the uncontested faith in technologythat might develop if one ignores the fact that rapid advances intechnological growth, which have improved the condition of thecity, carry important consequences for the individual and society.His "big bang" approach to the subject is in part justified becausemany of his contemporaries have moved far beyond even John

50. These variables, especially context, are in part stimulated by Bertrand deJouvenel, The Art of Conjecture, trans. Nikita Lary (New York: Basic Books, 1967).

51. Building a Sustainable Society (New York: W.W. Norton, 1981), 339-348.


Stuart Mill in articulating their faith in unlimited progress throughscientific rationalism. At this level, the arguments of Ellul arevaluable because his rhetoric forces one to see that the threat of asociety dominated by an interconnected set of specialized subsystemsbecomes a problem that demands attention in order to balance thethreat against the positive benefits received by material im-provements in the city. This positive contribution in isolating an im-portant subject for political discourse is nevertheless unfavorablymatched by his approach. His rhetoric is designed to challenge anypositive discourse deliberating the proper control of technologyrather than to isolate how the positive benefits for mankind can beassessed and pursued without our losing humanity in the process. Heis successful in raising a debate issue of universal political impor-tance, but his own vision of the resolution-the theological solu-tion-leads him away from deliberation into hortatory. If all sharedin Ellul's vision, the debate could end. We turn to the Word, rejectthe city, and all is well with God's world.

The losses for the city would be tremendous. Technologicaldevelopments have made possible many human advances that cer-tainly cannot be denied as humane improvements: food, shelter,and health care, alone, provide examples enough to introduce greatcaution in viewing technology as simply .ehumanizing. 62 One canview the city as filled with sinners, and raise one's gaze above thestreets, but it is difficult to ignore the fact that the streets are filledwith the people whose future can be most affected positively by the

52. It is altogether too easy to sit in the comfort of.a chateau and contemplate thedehumanizing implications of modern technology without considering the manyaspects of human existence that are dependent upon the improving technologies weemploy (contrast 224-225). The retirement regions of the world give reality to thehealth improvements made in advanced economic nations just as the need fortechnological assistance in less developed nations give reality to a need fortechnological expansion: the new breathing mode of immunization is a potentialtechnical means for removing measles, etc., in a quick, efficient and painless way.Surely the possibilities opened up for constructive leisure by new means of production,many already well known and practiced by the leisurely theory class right now, cannotbe, ignored in contemplations of a more humane existence. The means of man's over-coming the horrors of poverty are just as much products of technology as are those thatdisplace particularized human action. What student of culture lives without technical-ly advanced sound reproduction devices available for their pleasures in listening totraditional music? On Christian withdrawal see John Yoder's two books: The Chris-tian Witness to the State (Newton, Kansas: Faith and Life, 1964) and The Politics ofJesus (Grand Rapids, Mich: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1972).


technology. In his concern for spiritual renewal, the human conse-quences of material poverty are too much ignored. Insofar as hespeaks to those whose material plenty is sufficient, the effort to turnthem from greed and toward the life of the spirit can be onlypraised; insofar as he speaks for those of plenty seeking only theirown spiritual rewards, others must pay the costs for their trans-formed experience.

There is an irony worthy of note in Ellul's "theological solution"to his problem of Technique. The technological society transformshuman existence, traditionally understood, into a technically-basedexistence. Community is replaced by society with a vengence, leav-ing mankind divided into a set of atomistic individuals playing theirroles within an autonomous system. The processes of the system andefficiency of the procedures dominate all. Man, in his spiritual be-ing, is estranged. The irony is found in the fact that Ellul's theology,being based on the particular relation between an individual andGod, too, is clearly atomistic. The spiritual renewal is not social, itworries not about the relation between the City of Man and the Cityof God. The spiritual man is just as individuated as the technicalman. This irony cannot be taken lightly in a culture that many see asliberal-turned-Narcissistic. The solution of an individual's choosingto follow the Word not only buildsa barrier between the individualand civic concern for the city, leaving politics and society as onefinds it, it actually makes more rigid the structure of thetechnological society by providing a belief structure that separatesspiritual and civic activities. Ellul's theology can provide indirect"diffuse support" for the technological system by removing the ques-tion of its legitimacy from one's concerns. Religion serves the affec-tive function for a technological system. Follow the Word withfriends, colleagues, and neighbors, to be sure, but Ellul himselffailed in earlier efforts (in left politics and within the ReformedChurch of France) to bring about change in institutions and prac-tices through organizing mediating groups (56 and 84-90). He pro-videsa personal spiritual solution that permits one to ignore the city.

Ellul's rhetoric employs an old tactic that is questionable. If youcan set forth two options (unconstrained technology versus theWord), and show that one (unconstrained technology) is sodistasteful that we must avoid it at all costs, then the other (theWord) becomes the only choice. Since the Word can be followed, wemust accept it as our only solution. If everyone had Ellul's personalexperiences themselves, perhaps the argument would hold: After his


death, and only then, he promises the story of "my conversion-avery spectacular conversion. ...an historical account of this com -

plete about face... (215-216). He entices the reader with theconfession that it was a powerful conversion because he "did all Icould to fight God, yet I couldn't erase from my mind those three orfour hours I had lived. They were the fruit of neither illusion nor cir-cumstances. It was no use, I really had experienced them" (218).Well, we have not. Perhaps his promised pages will permit ahermeneutic walking in his shoes, if you will, but his current exe-gesis of his experiences and his reading of the Word do not permit usto grasp his theology as one can with, for example, Karl Barth orSoren Kierkgaard.

Ellul's criticisms of technology are so vehement that his workbrings to mind the words of Friedrich Nietzsche on the study ofhistory: "The fact that life does need the services of history must beas clearly grasped as that an excess of history hurts it." sa We need theservices of study into the unintended consequences of technology,but we can develop a "super-technological" philosopher, theequivalent of Nietzsche's "super-historical" philosopher, whotranslates insight concerning the limits of human action into an in-tellectual anomie concerning the achievement of any human pur-

53. The Use and Abuse of History, trans. Adrian Collin (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1949), 42. In fact, it seems that Ellul has become an intellectual of abstractionon the level of the most extreme modern thinkers. Both his abstraction of"technological society" and his "theological solution" seem to me to fit, ultimately, thechallenge to modern thinking leveled by Oswald Spengler in The Decline of the West,trans. Charles Francis Atkinson (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1932), II, 144:

Abstract thinking consists in the use of a finite word-framework into which it issought to squeeze the whole infinite content of life. Concepts kill Being andfalsify Waking-Being. Long ago in the springtime of language-history, whileunderstanding had still to struggle in order to hold its own with sensation, thismechanization was without importance for life. But now, from a being whooccasionally thought, man has become a thinking being, and it is the ideal ofevery thought-system to subject life, once and for all, to the domination of in-tellect. This is achieved in theory by according validity only to the known andbranding the actual as a sham and a delusion. It is achieved in practice by forc-ing the voices of the blood to be silent in the presence of universal ethical prin-ciples.

It is possible to apply in irony these words to Ellul's "system" of thought. Indeed, hissystem seems to fit his own discussion of propaganda delivering the individual "fromhis own self." See Propaganda, 160.


poses. Indeed, Ellul's criticisms of Marx's apocalyptic, universalistictheories might be applied to his own: "When Marxism becomesdogmatic, it is actually a lie (61)." Ellul's approach to theorizing isripe for slipping into extreme claims and dogma:

I see reality, and in this reality I know how to distinguish the dominant factsand tendencies for the future. And then I draw conclusions, whereas most of mycolleagues are fixated on the current phenomenon (which is doomed to fall intodecline), or else they are bogged down in the past. But when I make theseevaluations, they are not scientific, they are not scientific predictions. That typeof evaluation usually turns out to be in error (219).

With this self-understanding of Ellul's "realist" position, the poten-tial for dogmatic theorizing is high. It is not only counter-scientificreasoning, it is counter-classical reasoning as well.

The questions that Ellul forces us to confront must be viewedthrough diverse lenses if we are adequately to deal with thephenomenon of technology. The questions concerning the autonomyof the technological system must be answered by weighing thepossibilities of a human association that wills the system to servenatural ends (man, family, community, church), and therefore asystem pressed toward Gemeinschaft, against the threat of atechnological system's rationality replacing even the rational will ofa society's members selecting their own ends, and therefore becom-ing a supra-Gesellschaft. (This must be done with recognition thatsomeone must introduce any Technique.) Moreover, the assessmentmust be placed in an historical framework so that the assessment canbe seen in proper perspective: might Ellul only be "fixated on thecurrent phenomenon (which is doomed to fall into decline)"?

Most important, I think, Ellul's questions must be seen in apolitical context that treats the problem from a human rather thanan individualistic perspective: the decisions and choices concerningTechniques affect not only the people of a community, or of a na-tion, but now the world. Growth in the less developed nations is in-terconnected with the most developed just as the employment andsurvival of the least well off in a society is affected by its decision toslow down economic growth. These questions raise what are essen-tially moral problems that must be resolved by the city. A personalethic such as Ellul's that transforms the questions of the city intononquestions, largely because of the structure of the technologicalsystem, not only is inadequate, it is inhuman. It denies human ex-perience as the foundation for human consciousness by presuming


that human nature does not permit man to act willfully upon the en-vironment after his reflecting upon his experiences. This presump-tion is the most dehumanizing of all for it turns man into a plasticcontainer that merely processes experience, the perfect technologicalman. Ellul's normative analysis can be improved by simply restoringman, society, nature, and experience to their proper places. Forthose who have not had the benefit of Ellul's conversion experience,these restorations also provide the only path to consciousness of God.

The reality of Rio, then, is really not so unusual. The extremes ofwealth and poverty, natural beauty and artifact, sin and survivalmerely make clearer the paradoxes of the political. The material andthe spiritual coexist in the city. The struggle to develop tentativesettlements in the city through deliberations founded on the realitieshas no certain resolution. Ellul's rejection of the city for the statuehas strange similarities with gnostic solutions for society. Revolutionand revelation share the characteristic of missing the reality ofhuman existence by focusing on the presumption that the day to dayhuman condition is transformed by an abstraction. It is in therecognition that there are no solutions for these paradoxes that life inthe city can be appropriately maintained through political settle-ment. Technology and theology are both necessary. Only then canone fully grasp the important fact that Christ the Redeemer reachesout to Rio as an essential and integral part of the city.

Vanderbilt University GEORGE J. GRAHAM, JR.

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