From the wikipedia page: "It is often used to champion small, appropriate technologies"
I personally * LOATHE * the phrase "appropriate technology".
In practice, this term is usually used by elitist first worlders condescending to second and third worlders. I scoff at the idea that some sociology grad student in the US knows more about how "the street" should use technology than actual people, living their real lives in Laos, or Kenya, or somewhere.
Further, the "appropriate" technology is usually "really clever" crap. "Oh, wow, we can dig a 10 foot deep well using nothing more than a piece of PVC pipe and five hours of labor!". ...and yet, you'd never catch these first world people getting their water supply from a 10' deep hole in their backyard - they're totally in favor of chlorine, municipal water, and more.
"Appropriate" is a word that parents use to correct five year old children.
First world adults using it to correct others, when they won't put any skin in the game themselves, rubs me the wrong way.
"you'd never catch these first world people getting their water supply from a 10' deep hole in their backyard - they're totally in favor of chlorine, municipal water, and more."
Wells are actually pretty common in the US. It depends on the water table and population density of an area.
Personally, I've always interpreted the word "appropriate" to be aimed at correcting other first-worlders with (often dangerous) misconceptions about how development works. Case in point: your water system example.
Let's say you're an organization interested in improving the water situation in a rural village in Kenya. Which of these two options makes more sense?
1. A well that the village residents can build and maintain themselves with relatively small amounts of initial and ongoing costs, and that doesn't require specialized knowledge to keep running...
2. OR, a modern chlorinated water system, which depends on tons of pipes, valves, pumps, etc., and will require a massive construction effort to build, and will also need a steady supply of chlorine, and somebody who can fix all the pumps when they break, and somebody who knows enough about water treatment to keep the the water system from accidentally giving everybody cholera, and a steady supply of spare parts, etc. etc. etc.
I mean, yeah, in the best case, a modern chlorinated water system is a great thing... but you have to look at the whole picture and at the long term. A simple solution like a good well can have a real impact on a lot of people's lives, and unlike a proper water system has fewer expensive and dangerous failure modes. Oh, and by the way, the well solution was cheap enough that you've got enough money left over to go and build a well in the neighboring village, as well. Woohoo!
I agree that the term "appropriate technology" can be used in the matter in which you describe; however, to me it seems pretty obvious to say that technology is not a one-size-fits-all thing. There's no point in (for example) shipping a bunch of MRI machines or surgical robots to a rural clinic somewhere when what the clinic really needs is more rubber gloves, syringes, and malaria medication. In my mind, that's what the phrase "appropriate technology" is supposed to mean. Here's Steve's three-step process to a successful technological development intervention:
1. Actually learn about the people you're trying to help, preferably by living with them for a period of time. Learn about what resources (physical, educational, human, etc.) they have access to, and what resources they don't have. Learn about the problems they're facing in their day-to-day lives, and find out if the things you thought were problems going in actually are perceived as such by the people living with them.
2. Together with your new neighbors and friends, decide on a problem to try and address with a technical solution.
3. Decide on a technological solution that takes into account all of the stuff you learned in step 1 about what resources your population does and does not have access to.
The biggest and most common mistake that people working in development can make is to blindly throw technology at a problem, pat themselves on the back, and go home feeling good.
Decentralization may be nice, but it's generally much less efficient. Consumption would rise dramatically. Per-capita consumption decreases as centralization increases. Remember this from last year? http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=619099
Also, the book says:
[S]ince consumption is merely a means to human well-being,
the aim should be to obtain the maximum of well-being with
the minimum of consumption. The less toil there is, the
more time and strength is left for artistic creativity.
Modern economics, on the other hand, considers consumption
to be the sole end and purpose of all economic activity.
Consumption is a word that covers all kinds of ends. Unless you can create ex nihilo, artistic creativity is a consumptive endeavor.
> Decentralization may be nice, but it's generally much less efficient.
Depends entirely on the business in question and the technologies and human factors involved. There's a reason most dentists work in small practices, but electrical power and processors are made in large capital-intensive plants.
Actually I think a big dentist-center would be a cool thing. Less money wasted on competition, easier ways for patients to get a specialists opinion if needed, cheaper access to supply, more efficient use of dental technicians / staff in general.
I guess the scale of centralization is the real question.
I hate this sort of thing. Capitalism has delivered huge benefits in terms of prosperity, advancement and health. We've got to the point where someone willing to accept a lowered standard of living can take lots of time off and use it to focus on other things that are important to them. (The fact that people continue to toil to get more possessions just shows where their priorities lie).
Unfortunately there's always a small contingent who think that all this advancement is terrible and we'd be better off living the kind of "simple but happy" lives they condescendingly imagine people in the third world live.
Definitely a great book. If you're interested in human-scale development, you should definitely check out the writings of Leopold Kohr (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leopold_Kohr). E.F. Schumacher (of "Small is Beautiful" fame) was one of his students and Kohr writes even closer to the bone.
His books (my favorite: "The Overdeveloped Nations") are not only extremly insightful but actually fun to read.
I personally * LOATHE * the phrase "appropriate technology".
In practice, this term is usually used by elitist first worlders condescending to second and third worlders. I scoff at the idea that some sociology grad student in the US knows more about how "the street" should use technology than actual people, living their real lives in Laos, or Kenya, or somewhere.
Further, the "appropriate" technology is usually "really clever" crap. "Oh, wow, we can dig a 10 foot deep well using nothing more than a piece of PVC pipe and five hours of labor!". ...and yet, you'd never catch these first world people getting their water supply from a 10' deep hole in their backyard - they're totally in favor of chlorine, municipal water, and more.
"Appropriate" is a word that parents use to correct five year old children.
First world adults using it to correct others, when they won't put any skin in the game themselves, rubs me the wrong way.