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| History of technology |
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A technological revolution is a period in which one or more technologies is replaced by another novel technology in a short amount of time. It is a time of accelerated technological progress characterized by innovations whose rapid application and diffusion typically cause an abrupt change in society.
A technological revolution may involve material or ideological changes caused by the introduction of a device or system. It may potentially impact business management, education, social interactions, finance and research methodology, and is not limited to technical aspects. It has been shown to increase productivity and efficiency. A technological revolution often significantly changes the material conditions of human existence and has been seen to reshape culture. [1]
A technological revolution can be distinguished from a random collection of technology systems by two features:
1. A strong interconnectedness and interdependence of the participating systems in their technologies and markets.
2. A potential capacity to greatly affect the rest of the economy (and eventually society). [2]
On the other hand, negative consequences have also been attributed to technological revolutions. For example, the use of coal as an energy source have negative environmental impacts, including being a contributing factor to climate change and the increase of greenhouse gases [3] in the atmosphere, and have caused technological unemployment. Joseph Schumpeter described this contradictory nature of technological revolution as creative destruction. [4] The concept of technological revolution is based on the idea that technological progress is not linear but undulatory. Technological revolution can be:
The concept of universal technological revolutions is a "contributing factor in the Neo-Schumpeterian theory of long economic waves/cycles", [5] according to Carlota Perez, Tessaleno Devezas, Daniel Šmihula and others.
Some examples of technological revolutions were the Neolithic Revolution, the Industrial Revolution in the mid 1800s, the scientific-technical revolution about 1950–1960, and the Digital Revolution. The distinction between universal technological revolution and singular revolutions have been debated. One universal technological revolution may be composed of several sectoral technological revolutions (such as in science, industry, or transport).
There are several universal technological revolutions during the modern era in Western culture: [6]
Comparable periods of well-defined technological revolutions in the pre-modern era are seen as highly speculative. [7] One such example is an attempt by Daniel Šmihulato to suggest a timeline of technological revolutions in pre-modern Europe: [8]
Each revolution comprises the following engines for growth:
Technological revolutions has historically been seen to focus on cost reduction. For instance, the accessibility of coal at a low cost during the Industrial Revolution allowed for iron steam engines which led to production of Iron railways, and the progression of the internet was contributed by inexpensive microelectronics for computer development.[ citation needed ] A combination of low-cost input and new infrastructures are at the core of each revolution to achieve their all pervasive impact. [9]
Since 2000, there has been speculations of a new technological revolution which would focus on the fields of nanotechnologies, alternative fuel and energy systems, biotechnologies, genetic engineering, new materials technologies and so on. [10]
The Second Machine Age is the term adopted in a 2014 book by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee. The industrial development plan of Germany began promoting the term Industry 4.0. In 2019, at the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Japan promoted another round of advancements called Society 5.0. [11] [12]
The phrase Fourth Industrial Revolution was first introduced by Klaus Schwab, the executive chairman of the World Economic Forum, in a 2015 article in Foreign Affairs. [13] Following the publication of the article, the theme of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2016 in Davos-Klosters, Switzerland was "Mastering the Fourth Industrial Revolution". On October 10, 2016, the Forum announced the opening of its Centre for the Fourth Industrial Revolution in San Francisco. [14] According to Schwab, fourth era technologies includes technologies that combine hardware, software, and biology (cyber-physical systems), [15] and which will put an emphases on advances in communication and connectivity. Schwab expects this era to be marked by breakthroughs in emerging technologies in fields such as robotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, quantum computing, biotechnology, the internet of things, the industrial internet of things (IIoT), decentralized consensus, fifth-generation wireless technologies (5G), 3D printing and fully autonomous vehicles. [16]
Jeremy Rifkin includes technologies like 5G, autonomous vehicles, Internet of Things, and renewable energy in the Third Industrial Revolution. [17]
Some economists do not think that technological growth will continue to the same degree it has in the past. Robert J. Gordon holds the view that today's inventions are not as radical as electricity and the internal combustion engine were. He believes that modern technology is not as innovative as others claim, and is far from creating a revolution. [18]
In economics, Kondratiev waves are hypothesized cycle-like phenomena in the modern world economy. The phenomenon is closely connected with the technology life cycle.
Technology is the application of conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word technology can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible tools such as utensils or machines, and intangible ones such as software. Technology plays a critical role in science, engineering, and everyday life.
In sociology, an industrial society is a society driven by the use of technology and machinery to enable mass production, supporting a large population with a high capacity for division of labour. Such a structure developed in the Western world in the period of time following the Industrial Revolution, and replaced the agrarian societies of the pre-modern, pre-industrial age. Industrial societies are generally mass societies, and may be succeeded by an information society. They are often contrasted with traditional societies.
Technological utopianism is any ideology based on the premise that advances in science and technology could and should bring about a utopia, or at least help to fulfill one or another utopian ideal.
Erik Steenfeldt Reinert is a Norwegian economist, with development economics, economic history and history of economic policy as his specialties.
Neo-feudalism or new feudalism is a theorized contemporary rebirth of policies of governance, economy, and public life, reminiscent of those which were present in many feudal societies. Such aspects include, but are not limited to: Unequal rights and legal protections for common people and for nobility, dominance of societies by a small and powerful elite, a lack of social mobility, and relations of lordship and serfdom between the elite and the people, where the former are rich and the latter poor.
Technology governance means the governance, i.e., the steering between the different sectors—state, business, and NGOs—of the development of technology. It is the idea of governance within technology and its use, as well as the practices behind them. The concept is based on the notion of innovation and of techno-economic paradigm shifts according to the theories by scholars such as Joseph A. Schumpeter, Christopher Freeman, and Carlota Perez.
Carlota Perez is a British-Venezuelan scholar specialized in technology and socio-economic development. She researches the concept of Techno-Economic Paradigm Shifts and the theory of great surges, a further development of Schumpeter's work on Kondratieff waves. In 2012 she was awarded the Silver Kondratieff Medal by the International N. D. Kondratieff Foundation and in 2021 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate by Utrecht University.
Klaus Martin Schwab is a German mechanical engineer, economist, and founder of the World Economic Forum (WEF). He has acted as the WEF's chairman since founding the organisation in 1971. In May 2024, WEF announced that Schwab will move from his role as Executive Chairman to chairman of the Board of Trustees by January 2025. No successor has been named.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to technology:
W. Patrick McCray is a historian at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He researches, writes about, and teaches the history of science and the history of technology.
The End of Work: The Decline of the Global Labor Force and the Dawn of the Post-Market Era is a non-fiction book by American economist Jeremy Rifkin, published in 1995 by Putnam Publishing Group.
Innovation economics is new, and growing field of economic theory and applied/experimental economics that emphasizes innovation and entrepreneurship. It comprises both the application of any type of innovations, especially technological, but not only, into economic use. In classical economics this is the application of customer new technology into economic use; but also it could refer to the field of innovation and experimental economics that refers the new economic science developments that may be considered innovative. In his 1942 book Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, economist Joseph Schumpeter introduced the notion of an innovation economy. He argued that evolving institutions, entrepreneurs and technological changes were at the heart of economic growth. However, it is only in recent years that "innovation economy," grounded in Schumpeter's ideas, has become a mainstream concept".
Christopher Freeman was a British economist, recognised as one of the founders of the post-war school of Innovation Studies. He played a lead role in the development of the neo-Schumpeterian tradition focusing on the crucial role of innovation for economic development and of scientific and technological activities for well-being.
Technological unemployment is the loss of jobs caused by technological change. It is a key type of structural unemployment. Technological change typically includes the introduction of labour-saving "mechanical-muscle" machines or more efficient "mechanical-mind" processes (automation), and humans' role in these processes are minimized. Just as horses were gradually made obsolete as transport by the automobile and as labourer by the tractor, humans' jobs have also been affected throughout modern history. Historical examples include artisan weavers reduced to poverty after the introduction of mechanized looms. Thousands of man-years of work was performed in a matter of hours by the bombe codebreaking machine during World War II. A contemporary example of technological unemployment is the displacement of retail cashiers by self-service tills and cashierless stores.
Technological transitions (TT) can best be described as a collection of theories regarding how technological innovations occur, the driving forces behind them, and how they are incorporated into society. TT draws on a number of fields, including history of science, technology studies, and evolutionary economics. Alongside the technological advancement, TT considers wider societal changes such as "user practices, regulation, industrial networks, infrastructure, and symbolic meaning or culture". Hughes refers to the 'seamless web' where physical artifacts, organizations, scientific communities, and social practices combine. A technological transition occurs when there is a major shift in these socio-technical configurations.
Smihula waves are long-term waves of technological progress which are reflected also in long-term economic waves. They are a crucial notion of Daniel Šmihula's theory of technological progress.
"Fourth Industrial Revolution", "4IR", or "Industry 4.0" is a neologism describing rapid technological advancement in the 21st century. It follows the Third Industrial Revolution. The term was popularised in 2016 by Klaus Schwab, the World Economic Forum founder and executive chairman, who asserts that these developments represent a significant shift in industrial capitalism.
Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital: The Dynamics of Bubbles and Golden Ages is an academic book by Carlota Perez that seeks to describe the connection between technological development and financial bubbles as seen in the emergence of long term technology trends. The model described by Carlota Perez shows repeated surges of technological development over the past three centuries with examples such as: the age of steam and railways, the age of steel and electricity, mass production and the automobile and the current information/knowledge society.
The Great Reset Initiative is an economic recovery plan drawn up by the World Economic Forum (WEF) in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The project was launched in June 2020, and a video featuring the then-Prince of Wales Charles was released to mark its launch. The initiative's stated aim is to facilitate rebuilding from the global COVID-19 crisis in a way that prioritizes sustainable development.
The possibilities of billions of people connected by mobile devices, with unprecedented processing power, storage capacity, and access to knowledge, are unlimited. And these possibilities will be multiplied by emerging technology breakthroughs in fields such as artificial intelligence, robotics, the Internet of Things, autonomous vehicles, 3-D printing, nanotechnology, biotechnology, materials science, energy storage, and quantum computing.
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