Opposing the “technocratic paradigm” and “appreciating the small things”

Abstract

Pope Francis begins his critique of what he calls the “technocratic paradigm” by complaining about “the way that humanity has taken up technology and its development according to an undifferentiated and one-dimensional paradigm exalts the concept of a subject who, using logical and rational procedures, progressively approaches and gains control over an external object”. The mention of technology linked to business interests draws attention to another aspect of the technocratic paradigm, one that was already mentioned in passing. If the technocratic paradigm is a central part of the problem, a central part of the solution is “to recover the values and the great goals swept away by our unrestrained delusions of grandeur”. The Pope’s emphasis on the individual, the small, and the local, and on what individuals can accomplish wherever they may find themselves and whatever their circumstances, are among the potentially most fruitful ideas in Laudato Si’.