Automation, by intensifying both Promethean excitement and the anxiety surrounding what it displaces, is difficult to approach in a reasonable way. Ask someone what they think about automation and their answer will probably surprise you, even if you think you know them quite well. Conventional political divisions between left and right seem to be fading, and new fault lines are emerging as we confront the disappearance of work due to technology.

This issue explores the future of automation as a form of political and economic reorganization, as well as its derived concepts: the surrender of our decision-making capacity by making things run automatically, the existential questions that arise from treating machines as automatons, and the alienation we experience through the interaction of these forces when they are not properly addressed. A recurring theme is the importance of negotiating with the future of automation, rather than treating it as a force that acts blindly. This makes it especially appropriate to draw on methodologies from disciplines such as foresight and futures studies, several examples of which appear in this issue.

English text
95 pages