Beyond the Global Emergency

Abstract

This paper argues that external, technology-led views of futures tend to be one-sided and overlook significant interior aspects of reality. As everything is socially constructed, it follows that no technology stands alone. They arise from social processes that are, in many cases, centuries old. Human beings also enact their own individual and shared interior worlds. An integral perspective and the four-quadrant model give equal attention to interior/exterior and individual/collective phenomena. It also helps us to embrace and respect the contributions of many different disciplines. Part One uses these distinctions to raise questions about the views of prominent Silicon Valley figures and their particular framing of the “Digital revolution.” Part Two suggests how integral methods help us to “see with fresh eyes” and open up new and renewed strategies or “proto-solutions” to pressing global issues.