A Brief History Of The Future Jacques Attali Pdf Download
Irmgard Verzi
His work reveals a distinct vision of history and its successive stages, which are simultaneously ideological, technological and geopolitical. Furthermore, his work entails depicting the slow transformation of humanity into an artifact in which man becomes an object to escape death, and the geopolitical evolution toward chaos that accompanies such transformation; meanwhile, man is also waiting for an awakening leading to a new global governance, a sanctification of the essential makeup of mankind, taking into account the interest of future generations, and not letting prostheses invade it.
Since his earliest books, Attali foresaw and announced signals of the future, albeit weak at the time, that later came true: In La parole et l'outil (1976), he announced and described the shift from an energy-based society to an information-based society. In Bruits, in 1977, he announced what would later be the internet, YouTube, and the importance of musical practice; in La nouvelle économie française, in 1978, he discussed the coming emergence of the personal computer, hyper-surveillance and self-surveillance. In Les trois mondes, in 1980, he announced the shift of the centre of power around the Pacific. In L'ordre Cannibale, in 1980, he announced the advent of a prosthetic society, now known as transhumanism. In Histoires du temps, he announced the rapid pace of history and the growing immediacy of relationships. In Amours, he announced the emergence of poly-romantic relationships. In Au propre et au figuré, he announced the break-up of property and its use, and subsequently he invented the concept of the "nomadic object." In Lignes d'horizons, in 1990, he predicted the relative decline of US power. In Brève histoire de l'avenir, he announced a corporate power grab by health data and insurance companies. In L'homme nomade, he described the great movement of populations whose sedentary life was only a temporary stage.
Here now is the history of these orders and the manner of their birth and decline. From this account, extrapolating from facts seemingly trivial and insignificant, we will be able to identify the laws of history. It is essential that we understand these laws, for they will still be at work in the future and will enable us to predict its course.
A Brief History of the Future: A Brave and Controversial Look at the Twenty-First Century, by French writer Jacques Attali, is an international bestseller that casts a glimpse of what the planet Earth will be like in 50 years. Attali divides the history of mankind into three major political orders: the ritual (theological) order, the imperial (territorial) order, and the market (individualist) order. Based on the laws of the past, the book unfolds the future in five different waves that go from the decline of the American empire to a state of hyper democracy.
The Gist:
Imagine a world where pirates run amok, blowing themselves up in European city centers; where wars are ignited over lackof drinking water; where a global face-off between Islam and Christianitymakes World War II look like a water-balloon fight. According to economistand political scientist Jacques Attali, that is what the future has in storefor us by 2025. In the belief that past experiences are indicative futureevents, Attali combs through the history of human kind, all the way back to Homo Habilis, separating the past into nine distinct periods to isolate "what is possible, what changes andwhat is unvarying" and applies those trends to the coming century. Attali'spredictions range from the future of journalism (completely paperless) tothe end of the economic crisis (around 2011), offering a glimpse into thefuture that is both provocative and petrifying. (See 10 ideas that are changing the world right now.)
In the Short History of the Future, published in 2006, Attali presents his predictions on how the world's future can be shaped in the 21st century. In his book, the author makes a brief summary of the history of humanity before sorting out his predictions for the future, talking about the main factors affecting historical dynamics such as nomadism/settlement, capitalism, technological developments. Attali refers to the main pillars of power that determine world history as religious, military, and capitalist. The world has gone through the liturgical order stages. Power is in the hands of religious authorities, the imperial order, where power is primarily military, and the commercial order dominated by the bourgeoisie. The ideal of a religious order is theological, the main goal of military order is territorial, and the philosophy of commercial order is individualism, and the goal is wealth.
The first step he takes in the analysis is to define a specific counter-category to noise in music. The reason for this, he cites, is the peculiar autonomy the form has taken on in recent centuries, which he sees as indicative of wider historical, economic and political developments. He then divides the history of music into four periods: Sacrificing, Representing, Repeating and Composing. Each of these, Attali claims, were/are predictive of a coming shift in political economy. While Marxist analysis has long claimed that political and economic forces could be found influencing the form and content of cultural practices like music, Attali wants to flip this base/superstructure relationship. Instead of music articulating the economic reality of the present, he claims that music produced under these conditions articulates how things will change in the future.
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