Ellul’s alternative theory of technology: Anticipating the fourth milieu of virtuality

Jacques Ellul was a self-proclaimed ‘watchman’ over the progression of twentieth-century technology, and he argues that humans have adopted a sociological determinism that he dubbed ‘technique’, an idea explored in his widely read book The Technological Society (1964). Technique, for Ellul, explains both large-scale and small-scale trends in human civilizations by considering rationalized efficiency as the primary instigator of twentieth-century change. This article argues that Ellul’s conception of technique as a determining factor in technological change has been subsumed by a trend not for rationalized efficiency but rather for evolved efficiency. Specifically, I look at the underlying hypothesis that informed Ellul’s thought – his theory of the three milieus – to offer an interpretative framework for understanding how several current civilizations have moved into a fourth milieu of virtuality. Positing a fourth milieu could potentially revitalize Ellulian scholarship in studies of technology, media ecology and sustainability.