Automatic Society

In July 2014 the Belgian newspaper Le Soir claimed that France, Belgium, the United Kingdom, Italy, Poland and the United States may lose between 43 and 50 per cent of their jobs within ten to fifteen years. Across the world, integrated automation, one key result of the so-called data economy, is leading to a drastic reduction in employment in all areas from the legal profession to truck driving, from medicine to stevedoring.

In this first volume of a new series, the leading cultural theorist Bernard Stiegler advocates a radical solution to the crisis posed by automation and consumer capitalism more generally. He calls for a decoupling of the concept of labour (meaningful, intellectual participation) from employment (dehumanizing, banal work), with the ultimate aim of eradicating employment altogether. By doing so, new and alternative economic models will arise, where individuals are no longer simply mined for...