Rebels Against the Future: The Luddites and Their War on the Industrial Revolution: Lessons for the Computer Age

Regular price $ 21.99

by Sale Kirkpatrick

Basic Books

4/17/1996, paperback

SKU: 9780201407181

 

This is the story of a bold uprising by the earliest victims of the first Industrial Revolution, viewed from the perspective of today's second Industrial Revolution, a vivid reminder that the current turmoil, driven by rapidly developing technologies and the global economy, is every bit as disruptive as the one created by the steam engine and laissez-faire. Rebels Against the Future is a work of careful scholarship, but it is also an exciting tale of people whose resistance to technology was so dramatic that their name has entered our vernacular. "Luddite" today refers to anyone unmoved by laptop computers and cellular phones, but this book reminds us that the Luddites were in fact real people, English working men who saw their livelihoods and homes, their communities and countryside, destroyed by the onrush of industrial capitalism.

About the Author:

Kirkpatrick Sale is a contributing editor of The Nation and the author of many books, including Conquering Paradise: Christopher Columbus and the Columbian Legacy.