Rebels Against The Future: The Luddites And Their War On The Industrial Revolution: Lessons For The Computer Age [Paperback]

Kirkpatrick Sale (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 17, 1996

Kirkpatrick Sale is at the tumultuous center of a technology backlash, actively challenging Bill Gates on the one hand and the Unabomber on the other. The subject of bets, barbs, and grudging praise in the pages of WIRED, The New York Times, Newsweek, and The New Yorker, Rebels Against the Future takes us back to the first technology backlash, the short-lived and fierce Luddite rebellion of 1811. Sale tells the compelling story of the Luddites’ struggle to preserve their jobs and way of life by destroying the machines that threatened to replace them; he then invokes a new-Luddite spirit in response to today’s technological revolution and calls for another sort of rebellion: not one of violence but rather of intellectually and ethically sound protest.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Legendary Englishman Ned Ludd hated work so much that his master whipped him, whereupon he took revenge by destroying his knitting frame. In 1812, his followers, the Luddites?weavers, combers, dressers of wool and artisans?banded together to fight with pike and gun "progress, or what was held to be progress." With the introduction of the Industrial Revolution, their former way of life was ending. The Luddites took their stand in Nottingham at the factory of one William Cartwright. The retribution, according to the author, "called forth the greatest spasm of repression Britain ever in its history used against domestic dissent." Sale draws distinct portraits of both sides. The Luddites, reminiscent of the quixotic Irish Fenians of the 1860s, fought not only for survival but also for principle, sacrificing their lives for land and better conditions for laborers. The mill owners and politicians, on the other hand, were anti-union, pro-child labor, polluters of stream and sky and in favor of mass deforestation and demanded 10- to 18-hour workdays. Sale (The Conquest of Paradise) also displays the Luddites' situation in a modern context when he compares the Industrial Revolution to the information superhighway, situations "with unprecedented technological consequences." He has done a magnificent job of showing us the past and given us a peek into our future.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Library Journal

For a brief 15 months from late 1811 to early 1813, the Luddites challenged central England's law and order. This unique attack by workers upon a segment of the first industrial revolution, the manufacture of textiles, is meticulously covered by Sale in a chronological manner. Sale, a founder of the New York Green Party and author of The Green Revolution (LJ 7/93), constructs a list of principles from the Luddites' actions and the political-economic-legal response, which he applies to our present time in the last quarter of the book. Here Sale attacks the computer and its intrusion into our lives and the world's environment and economics. Essential for history of science collections and recommended for others.
Michael D. Cramer, Virginia Polytechnic & State Univ. Libs, Blacksburg
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Basic Books; Pbk. Ed edition (April 17, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0201407183
• ISBN-13: 978-0201407181
• Product Dimensions: 8.7 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #246,907 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Eloquent, Provocative & Thoughtful Critique !, June 16, 2000

By 

Barron Laycock "Labradorman" (Temple, New Hampshire United States) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rebels Against The Future: The Luddites And Their War On The Industrial Revolution: Lessons For The Computer Age (Paperback)

"Rebels Against The Future" is a book with an important, relevant, and timely message. Written by Sales Kirkpatrick, long-time editor of "The Nation", the book describes the historical struggle for human rights against the forces of technological innovation by way of the saga of Ned Ludd & his followers. By detailing this example, the author illustrates how difficult it is, both historically and culturally, for individual workers & ordinary people to successfully come to terms with the anonymous and often overwhelming forces of an intractable and self-propelled technical dynamic; industrial progress.

I first came across this book last year by way of the internet; an excerpt of it was posted on a neo-Luddite site I was browsing through. Reading this short portion hooked me on Mr. Kirkpatrick's writing style and substance. This is a book ostensibly devoted to the iconoclastic revolt by a small but determined group of nineteenth century English cottage workers against the hurtful introduction of new machines that, in essence, deprived them of an opportunity to make a living and support themselves and their families. It was the first documented account of a group rebelling against the enforced imposition by industrialists of new technology that was contrary to their own social and economic interests. It was not all machinery that the so-called "Luddites" rebelled against; it was only those technological innovations "but all Machinery hurtful to Commonality". He forwards an impressive, multi-faceted argument; each facet of the argument bearing on various aspects of what the author associates with various characteristics of technologies.

Thus, Kirkpatrick ascribes a "motif industriale" on such technologically-based innovation such that; first, technologies are never neutral, & some are hurtful; second, industrialism is always a cataclysmic process, destroying the past, roiling the present, making the future uncertain; third, only those serving an apprenticeship to nature can be trusted with machines, fourth; the nation-state, synergistically intertwined with industrialism, will always come to its aid and defense, making revolts futile and reform ineffectual; fifth, that resistance to the industrial system, based on moral principles and rooted in some sense of moral revulsion, is not only possible but necessary; sixth, that resistance to industrialism must force not only "the machine question" but the viability of industrial society into public consciousness and debate; seventh, philosophically, resistance to industrialism has to be embedded in an ideology that is morally informed, carefully articulated, and widely shared; and eighth, if industrial civilization does not eventually crumble from determined resistance within its walls, it seems certain to eventually crumble of its own accumulated excesses and instabilities.

Of course, the lessons from the experience of the Luddites are central to the issues of our own time. Everywhere in the burgeoning postindustrial world citizens face the same hurtful, impersonal, dehumanizing, and disenfranchising effects of the rapidly changing technological landscape. The central issue of runaway technological progress is the degree to which it acts without meaningful citizen input to determine the nature of the society it increasingly interrupts, disrupts, and alters through a ceaseless and seemingly unmanaged and undirected dynamic of industrial innovation. There seems to be no human face to this process, and it appears to be unresponsive, insensitive, and totally indifferent to its dehumanizing effect on the millions of individual human beings who are so profoundly and negatively affected by its ministrations. This is an important and thought-provoking book, and one every concerned citizen should take the time and energy to read.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I have a Luddite moment..., February 12, 2006

By 

Jeffrey Dorn "Blackshoepirate" (westbrook, me United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Rebels Against The Future: The Luddites And Their War On The Industrial Revolution: Lessons For The Computer Age (Paperback)

Years ago I was sitting in traffic on the South East Expressway in Boston, MA. I had just spent the better part of the day fixxing automobiles for people. That was my job. That is what I do. Trying to get home so I could "relax" was a chore. I lived maybe 30 min. away from my work but spent better than an hour just sitting in the hot July sun while the conjested traffic inched it's way along slowly, burning precious fossile fuel, spewing carbon & other noxious fumes into the air surrounding Boston. I was not happy. I called my wife on our ancient "Bag Phone". We discussed moving out of the Boston metro region so we could slow down the pace, relax a bit more and just enjoy life.
I had a Luddite moment. I realized then that I was working hard to keep all this technology together just so people could get to their own jobs to earn the money needed to keep their technology working. It dawned on me how futile all this stress and effort are... We are killing ourselves to support technology and all the time fooling ourselves with the idea that this modern life style is somehow better than in the good old days. I did not have an urge to smash any machines but I did want to stop the world and get off. Am I really any happier now than I would be if I were a village blacksmith in 1812? What do I really need to be happy? What does all this wonderful modern technology really cost me in blood, sweat and tears? I cash my paycheck, buy food and fuel, pay my bills, look at the remainder and wonder if that 1812 blacksmith was any worse off, realatively than I am today.
Sales book chronicles a moment in the history of labor struggle. Make of it what you will... He has documented a story that needs to be told if we as a society are to look at the big picture of ourselves and ask... How did We get here? Is this the right direction to be going? Can we survive and sustain this modern lifestyle?
I suggest reading at least chapters 8 and 10. I also suggest reading it along with a UE published book titled "Labors untold story" and Howard Zinns work "Peoples History"
Comfort is a realative thing.

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Insightful, Interesting & Thoughtful Look At The Luddites!, June 21, 2000

By 

Barron Laycock "Labradorman" (Temple, New Hampshire United States) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Rebels Against The Future: The Luddites And Their War On The Industrial Revolution: Lessons For The Computer Age (Paperback)

"Rebels Against The Future" is a book with an important, relevant, and timely message. Written by Sales Kirkpatrick, long-time editor of "The Nation", who describes the historical struggle for human rights against the forces of technological innovation by way of the saga of Ned Ludd & his followers. By detailing this example, the author illustrates how difficult it is, both historically and culturally, for individual workers & ordinary people to successfully come to terms with the anonymous and often overwhelming forces of an intractable and self-propelled technical dynamic; industrial progress.

I first came across this book last year by way of the internet; an excerpt of it was posted on a neo-Luddite site I was browsing through. Reading this short portion hooked me on Mr. Kirkpatrick's writing style and substance. This is a book ostensibly devoted to the iconoclastic revolt by a small but determined group of nineteenth century English cottage workers against the hurtful introduction of new machines that, in essence, deprived them of an opportunity to make a living and support themselves and their families. It was the first documented account of a group rebelling against the enforced imposition by industrialists of new technology that was contrary to their own social and economic interests. It was not all machinery that the so-called "Luddites" rebelled against; it was only those technological innovations "but all Machinery hurtful to Commonality". He

forwards an impressive, multi-faceted argument; each facet of the argument bearing on various aspects of what the author associates with various characteristics of technologies.

Thus, Kirkpatrick ascribes a "motif industriale" on such technologically-based innovation such that; first, technologies are never neutral, & some are hurtful; second, industrialism is always a cataclysmic process, destroying the past, roiling the present, making the future uncertain; third, only those serving an apprenticeship to nature can be trusted with machines, fourth; the nation-state, synergistically intertwined with industrialism, will always come to its aid and defense, making revolts futile and reform ineffectual; fifth, that resistance to the industrial system, based on moral principles and rooted in some sense of moral revulsion, is not only possible but necessary; sixth, that resistance to industrialism must force not only "the machine question" but the viability of industrial society into public consciousness and debate; seventh, philosophically, resistance to industrialism has to be embedded in an ideology that is morally informed, carefully articulated, and widely shared; and eighth, if industrial civilization does not eventually crumble from determined resistance within its walls, it seems certain to eventually crumble of its accumulated excesses and instabilities.

Of course, the lessons from the experience of the Luddites are central to the issues of our own time. Everywhere in the burgeoning postindustrial world citizens face the same hurtful, impersonal, dehumanizing, and disenfranchising effects of the rapidly changing technological landscape. The central issue of runaway technological progress is the degree to which it determines the nature of the society it constantly interrupts, disrupts, and alters through its ceaseless dynamic of industrial innovation. There is no human face to this process, and it seems to be unresponsive, insensitive, and totally indifferent to the dehumanizing effect on the individual human beings who are so profoundly and negatively affected by its alterations, wrenching changes, and undemocratically derived consequences. This is an important and thought-provoking book, and one every concerned citizen should take the time and energy to read.