Ivan Illich
THE RIGHT TO USEFUL
UNEMPLOYMENT
and its professional enemies
MARION BOYARS - LONDONabhi Cama by ees Mace
ste 162 Rade Ro, Dos Mil Ontario HOA TAS
ALLRIONTS RESERVED
a rt eget cd son nd
Pine and bound in Great Bean by
‘Trowbridge & Baber
CONTENTS
Foreword
Introduction
Disabling Market Intensity
Disabling Professions
Enabling Distinctions
Equity in Useful Unemployment
Outflanking the New Professional
‘The Post-proiessional EthosABOUT THE AUTHOR
Ivan Mich was bor in 1926, He studied theology and
philosophy at the Gregorian University in Rome and
Sbtained a doctorate im history at the Univensty of
Salzburg, He went 10 the United States in 1951,
tuere he served as astant pastor in an Trsh-Puerto
Rican parish in New York Cty. From 1956 to 1960 he
twa vieerector of the Catholic University of Puerto
Rico. Illich was a co-founder of the Center for
Intercultural Documentation (CIDOC), in Cuernava.
‘ca Mexico, where he directed research seminars on
‘Suatiutional Altersatives in = Technological Society’,
veith special focus on Latin America until 1976. van
Tiles writings have appeared in many newspapers
and journals including The New Yok Times, The New
York Reoiew of Boats, The Saturday Review, Expr
Kardach, Siempre, Excelsior de Mexieo, America, Cama.
weal, Let Temps Moderne, Le Monde, Le Nowel Obie
tan The Beloit, The Guardian and The Lane. He is
the author of Celebration of Auarenss, Descholng
‘Soy, Tol jor Comat, Energy and Equity, Limits to
Matiine Metical Nemes ~ the Expropriation of Heath,
‘and (oth others) Disabling Profession
FOREWORD
fn the last decade or 0 1 have prepared and
published a number of enays* on the industrial mode
Fr production. During this period, I have focused on
the proceses tizough which growing dependence on
inate produced goods and services gradually erodes
=Descooting Sci (Caer Boyar 1971)
“Fodster Cia (Cater oar 17)
Emr gy ener Bran. ;
Helin farce Boyan 1970)
‘piabhing Protons (Mario Boyar, 1872)the conditions necessary for a convivial lf. Examin-
ing distinct areas of economic growth, each essay
demonstrates general re: urewales are inevitably
destroyed when the industrial mode of production
achieves the predominance that [have termed ‘radi
cal monopoly. This and my previous ettays describe
how industrial growth produces the modernization of
poverty.
“Modemized poverty appears when the intensity of
market dependence reaches a certain threshold. Sub-
jectvely, {is the experience of frustrating affluence
that occur in pertons mutilated by their reliance on
the riches of industrial productivity Tt deprives those
affected by it of their freedom and power to act
autonomously, to live creatively: it confines them to
survival through being plugged into market relations
And prectey because this new impotence isso deeply
experienced i is with difficlty expresed. For exam-
ple, we are the witneses of a barely perceptible
transformaton in ordinary language: verbs which
formerly ecpressed satisfying actions have been
replaced by nouns which name packages designed for
passive contimption only — to learn’ becomes “to
accumulate credit. A profound Ghange in individial
and social selfimages. is here teflected.” And’ the
layman is n0t the only one who has dificlty in
accurately expressing what he experiences. The
profesional economist is unable to recognize the
Poverty thst his conventional instruments fail to
‘noover. Nevertheles, the new routant of impoverah
‘ment continues to spread. ‘The peculiarly moder
8
inability to, use. personal. endowments, community
wealth, and environmental resources in an avtono-
mmousiway infects every aspect of life where a profes-
sionally engineered commodity has sucoceded in
replacing a culturally shaped usewalue. The oppor:
tunity to experience personal and social satisfaction
‘utsde the market is thus destroyed. I am poor, for
‘example, when the use-value of my feet is lost because
Tlive in Los Angeles or work on the thrty-8fth floor of
saky-scraper.
This new impotence-produsing poverty must not
bbe confused with the widering gap between the
consumption of rich and poorin a world where basic
‘needs are increasingly shaped by industrial commod
ties This gap isthe form traditional poverty assumes
in an industrial society, and the conventional terms of
clase struggle appropriately reveal and reduce it. T
further distinguish. modernized poverty from the
burdensome price exacted by the externalities which
increased levels of production spew into the environ-
tment. Ieis clear that thee kinds of polation, ste,
land taxation are unequally imposed. Correspond!
ingly, defences against such depredations are un
ually distributed. But like the new gaps in acces,
such inequities in social cot are aspects of industria
lized poverty for:which economic indicators and
‘objective verification can be found. Such is not troe
for the industrialized impotence that affects both rich
and poor. Where this kind of poverty reigns, life
ithout addicve acces to commodities i rendered
[imposible or criminal - or both, Making do without
°consumption becomes imponible, not just for the
Sverage consumer, but even for the poor. All orm of
trelfare rom affirmitive action to job training, are of
ho help. The liberty to design and craft one’s own
distinctive dwelling is abolished in favour of the
‘bureaucratic provision of standardized housing in the
United State, Cuba or Sweden. The organization of
employment, sil, building resources, of rales and
‘edit favour shelter ana commodity rather than as an
“hcivitz, Whether the product is provided. by an
aiepreneu: or an apparatchik, the effective result is
the same: tien impotence, our specifically meer
us, we_are eft useless unless employed on_ajob or
‘engaged in consumption: the attempt to build 2
STAs ane outide the contol of eve
specialists appears as anarchic conceit, We lose sight
of our resourees, lose control over the environmental
‘conditions which make: these resources applicable,
Tove taste fx selCeliant coping wieh challenges from
‘without and anxiety from withia. Take childbirth in
Mexico today. Delivery without professional care has
become untainkable for those women whose husbands
hhold regular employment and, therefore, access to
social services, no matter how marginal or tenuous, is
denied, They move in circles where the production of,
babies faithfully reflects the patterns of industrial
‘outputs. Yet their sisters who live in the slums of the
poor oF the villages of the isolated still feel quite
competent to give birth on their own mats; they are
10
til unaware that they face & modern indictment of
Sriminal neglect toward ther child, But a profesion-
Sly engineered delivery models reach these indepen-
‘emt women, the desire, competence; and conditions
for autononmous behaviour are being destroyed.
For advanced industrial society, the modernization
cof poverty means that people are helpless to recognize
EvRdence unless it has been certified by a profesional
ee he 2 television weather commentator or an
educator) organic discomfort becomes intolerably
hicatening unless if has been. medicalized into
Gependence ona therapist; neighbours and friends
Gre lot unless vehicles bridge the separating distance
Created by the vehicles in the first place). In short
fost of the time we find ourselves out of touch wit
‘Gar worl, out of sight of thowe for whom we work
Frome wih what we fee
“This say is a. posteript to my book, Tools for
onisality, published in 1973. Te reicets the changes
‘Which have occurred during the past decade, both in
Cconomie realty and in my-own pereeptions of it. It
Gitiner a rather lange inrease in the non-technical,
‘itial and symbolic powers of our major technolo
GI and bureaucratic systems, and s corresponding
decrease in their scientific, technical, and instrument:
GT credibility In 1968, for example, it was still quite
teary to dismiss organized lay resistance to professional
Gominance as nothing more than a throwback to
fomanti obscurantst or elitist fantasies The grass
Toots common sense assesment. of technological
Duteme which T then outlined, seemed childish or
nTHE RIGHT TO USEFUL UNEMPLOWMENT
retrograde to the politcal leaders of citizen activism,
and to the ‘radical’ profesionals who laid claim to the
tutorship of the poor by. means of their special
knowledge. ‘The: reorganization of: late industrial
society around professionally defined needs problems,
and solutions was still the commonly accepted value
implicit in ideological, politial, and juridical systems
‘otherwise clearly and sometimes violently. opposed to
fone another.
Now the picture has) changed. A. hallmark of
advanced and enlightened technical competence isa
self-confident community, neighbourhood or group of
Citizens engaged in the systematic analysis and con«
sequent ridicule of the ‘need ‘probleme’, and, ‘solu-
tions’ defined for them by the agents of professional
stablishments. In the sixties, lay opposition to legislat-
jon based on expert opinion still sounded like anti-
scientific bigotry. Today, lay: confidence in public
policies based upon the experts opinion is temuotis
Indeed: Now thousands reach their own judgments
and,.at great cost, engage in citzien action withoat
any professional. tutorthip;. through. personal,
dependent effort, they gain the scientific information
they ‘need. Sometimes risking limb freedom, and
respectability, they-bear witness to a newly mature
scientific attitude. They know, for example, that the
quality and amount of technical evidence sufficiently
conclusive t6 oppose atomic power plants, the rnulti-
plication of intensive-care units, compulsory edueat-
fon, foetal. monitoring, psychosurgery, electro-shock
‘weatment, or genetic engineering is also simple and
2
FOREWORD,
clear enough for the layman to grasp and utilize.
| “en. years ago, compulsory schooling. was till
| projected by powerful taboos. Today, its defenders
Be crn alinost,-cxclusively ,cither, tcachers.. whose. jobs
depend upon, it or, Marxist ideologues who defend
| professional knowledgesholders in a shadow attle
“against the hip-bourgeoisie, Ten years ago, the myths
about the effectiveness of modern medical instiations
‘were still unquestioned. For example, most textbooks
Accepted the beliefs that adult Ife expectancy was
creasing, that treatment for cancer postponed
| death, that, the, availability of doctors ‘produced
iicater infant survival rates. Since then people have
‘discovered’ what vital statistics have always shown
saul i expectancy hasnt changed in any cally
icant way over the last few generations slower
Dips meet-tich counties today shan in our grand
parents’ ime, and lower than in many poor nations.
Ten. year ago, universal access to postaccondary
schooling, t0 adult edueation, to preventative
‘ine, to highways, o a wired global village were still
prestigious goals. Today, the great_myth-making
| Htuals organized around education, transportation,
Fiealth care, urbanization have indeed been 2artly
demystifed; they have however not yet been dis-
“esabished,
Shadow prices and increased consumption gaps are
aspects of the new poverty. But my princip-
interest is directed towards a diferent concomi-
ant of modernization ~ the proces: through which
“autonomy istundermined, satisfaction is dulled, exper-
13ience is flattened out, needs are frustrated for nearly
‘everyone. For example, I have examined the
wide ubstacies to mutual prescnee which are neceet
_ary side effects of energy-intensive transportation. T
have wanted to define the power limits of motors
equitably used to increase access to one another. I
recognize, of course, thar high speeds inevitably
impose a skewed distribution of harriedness, noise,
pollution, anid enjoyment of privilege. But my empha
sis is other, My arguments are focused on the negative
interalities of modernity ~ such as time-consuming
acceleration, sick-making health care, stupefying edu-
tation. ‘The unequal distribution of these ersatz
benefits, o the unequal imposition of their negative
‘erlemalites, ae corollaries ) my basic argument. Tam
interested in the direct and specific effects of modem-
ized poverty, in human tolerance for such effects and
in the possibility of escaping the new misery. [share
with others a deep desire 10 see greater justice. I am
absolutely opposed to the unjust distribution of what
‘can be genuinely shared vith: pleasure, But T have
found it necessary, these last few years, to examine
carefully the objects of any and every redistribution
proposal. Today T see my task even more clearly thant
when T first started talking and writing about the
‘counterproductive mythmaking that is latent in all
late industrial enterprises. My aim has been to detect.
tnd denounce the false affluence which is) always
lunjust because it can only frustrate. Through this
kind of analysis one can tegin to develop the theory
which would inspire the social, regeneration
4
possible for twentieth-century man,
‘During these last years I have found it necessary to
‘examine, again and again, the correlation between,
the nature of tools and the meaning of justice that
prevails in the society that ses them. I could not help
but observe the decline of freedom” tn societies IN
aE. ge, T had to weigh
i ‘Between new tools that enhance the
production of commodities and thote equally moder
‘oes that ‘permit the generation of values in use;
between rights to tiaw-prodced commodities and the
level of liberties thar permit satisfying and creative
Personal expression; Between paid employment
Jind useful unemployment. And in each dimension
of the trade-off between heteronomous management
fand autonomous action Ifound that the language
‘hat would perihie us to insist on the later bas to
bbe recovered with pains. Tam, of course, like those
whom [seek as my readers, so cleafly committed toa
radically equitable ditibution of goods, rights and
jobs thacI ind i an one our
\SFrggle or this side of justice. I find it much more
Fuportant and difiealt to deal with its complement
the Politics of Conviviality. L use this term in the
technical sense that T have given to it in Tools for
Conivialiy, There the term designates the struggle for
fan equitable disuibution of the liberty to generate
{eevlues and for the instramentation ofthis iberty
bby the assignment of an_absolute priority to the
“production of those industrial and professional com-
niodities that confer.on_the least advantaged the
15‘reatest power to generate valucs in use
Convivial Politics are based on the insight thatin a
‘modern society both wealth and jobs can be equitably
shared and enjoyed in liberty oniy,when-both. ace
Timited by. a. political. process. Excessive forms_of
‘wealth. and. prolonged: formal -employment, —na~
‘matter Row well distributed, destroy the socal, ul.
ara and environmental conditions for equal product-
ive freedom. Bits and waus which stand for units oF
information and of energy respectively) when. pack
aged into any mass-produced commodity in amounts
‘that pass threshold, inevitably constitute impoverish-
ing wealth, Such impoverishing wealth is either too
sare be Gned or is deuce a he feedor
iberty ofthe weakest. With each-of my exays
have attempted to make a contribution to the polic-
al process by which the socially critical thresholds of
enrichment are recognized by citizens and translated
into society-wide ceilings or limite.
INTRODUCTION
Fifty years age, most of the words heard by an
American were personally spoken to him as an
individual, or to somebody standing nearby. Only
‘occasionally did words reach him as the undifferen-
‘iated member of a crowd - in the classroom or
church, at a rally or a circus. Words were mostly like
handwritten, sealed letters, and not like the junk that
now pollutes our mail. Today, words that are directed
to one person's attention have become rare. Engin-
cered staples of images, ideas, feelings and opinions,
packaged and delivered through the media, assault
7our sensibilities with round-the-clock regularity. Two
points now become evident: 1) what is occurring with
language fts the pattern of an increasingly wide range
of need-satisfaction relationships; 2) this replacement
‘of convivial means by manipulative industrial ware is
truly universal, and is relentlessly making the New
York teacher, the Chinese commune member, the
Bantu schoolboy, and the Brazilian sergeant alike. In
this postscript to my essay Tools for ConcsialityT shall
do three things: 1) describe the character of a
commodity/marketintensive society. in which the
very abundance of commodities paralyzes the autono-
ous creation of use-values; 2) insist on the hidden
role that professions play in such society by shaping
its needs; 3) expose some illusions and propose some
strategies to break the professional power that perpe-
‘tates market dependence.
18
- w
DISABLING. MARKET INTENSITY
Grsis has come to mean that moment when doctors,
diplomats, bankers and assorted social engineers take
fover and liberties are suspended. Like patients,
nations go on the critical list. Crisis, the Greek te-m
that has designated ‘choice’ or ‘turning point’ in all
‘modern languages now means ‘driver, step on the
‘gas, Crisis. now evokes an ominous but tractaole
threat against which money, manpower and manage-
‘ment can be tallied. Intensive care for the dying,
bureaucratic tutelage for the victim of discrimination,
fission for the energy glutton, are typical responses.
19jects sae
pap Yanan asad roe lpoeete
tr whale on the ide eect of roses
Glacier whe Ine ot wee ee ee
| Show proper on Wie Wont sot Wass ae hore
| sneered halle sonpean se actor aioe
| Sioa wae which i he an,
fnanced by top etd. Crst undead aa a
oper pager igeingalimaciloreden
sxete of be sete wale apimedopiee gooc gee
Dee siiuis bocce merece hemaion
Revie esol ounce
of taro wean todos tate deri
peopl whewantto unter
Ter seed rhe en Wil en
inane ploretnn vicka aeecetienes en
tment Lined, tins fea the etal arte
cso Secon lon penis adealy Teas
ssrecof tlt tinct gt male te pat
Yaadiieeria ant adits oe teens
Shel natn beth he Usted St sh at
wrod tae
A world-wide choice
An only a few decades, the world has become an
amalgam. Human responses to everyday occurrences
have been standardized. Though languages and gods
still appear to be: different, people daily. join the
stupendous majority who march to the beat of the
| very same megarmachine. The light switch by the
door has replaced the dozens of ways in which fires,
20
‘candles and lanterns were formerly kindled. In ten
Yeats, the number of switch-users in the world has
tripled: flush and paper have become essential con:
tions for the relief of the bowels. Light that does not
flow from high-voltage networks and hygiene without
tissue paper spell poverty. for ever more people.
Expectations grow, while hopeful trust in one’s own
competence and, the concem for others rapidly
decline.
‘The now soporific, now raucous intrusion of the
media reaches deeply into the commune, the village,
the corporation, the school. The sounds made by the
editors. and announcers of programmed texts daily
pervert the words of a spoken language into the
building blocks for packaged messages. Today, one
‘must either be isolated and cut off, or a carefully
guarded, affluent drop-out, to allow one’s children to
play in an environment where they Isten to people
{ater than to star, speaker, or insructors. All over
‘he world, one-cait $66 THe rapid encroachinent of
the -disiplined- acquiescence that thanterze "the
audience, the dent, the customer: The sandardiza
Hot athiratn acon pronzanmor
Te now becomes cleat that most of the word’
communities are facing exactly the same ertcal love
People mus either remain ciphers in the conditioned
rowel that surges towards greater dependence (hus
hecenitaing savage battles fora shar of the drug 0
feed their habit), or they must find the courage that
alone saves in a panic: sand still and look around
for another way out than the obvious marked exie
aBut many, when told that Bolivians, Canadiaris and
“Hungarians all face the same fandamental choice, are
rot simply annoyed, but deeply offended, The idea
Eppears not only foolish but shocking. They fal to
‘Getect the sameness in the new bitter degradation that
(inderlies the hunger of the Indian in the Altiplano,
the neurosis of the worker in Amsterdam, and the
‘oinical corruption ofthe bureaucrat in Warsaw.
Towards a cultre for staples
Development has had the same effect in all societies
cooryone has been enmeshed in a new ‘web of
Gependence on commodities that flow oat of the same
Kind of machines factories, clinics, television studios,
think ranks. To satisfy this dependence, more of the
ame must be produced: standardized, erigineeted
foods, designed for the Fotute consumers who will Be
Trained by the engineer's agent toneed what he OF she
|p offered. These products ~ be they tangible goods or
intangible services — constitute the industrial staple
Theis imputed monetary value as a commodity i€
determined by state and market in varying propor:
tions, Thus different eultures become insipid residues
Of taditional styles of accion, washed up in one
ford. wide wasteland: an arid terrain devastated by
The machinery needed to produce and consume. On
the banks of the Seine and those of the Niger, people
Ihave unlearned how to milk, because the white stuft
ow comes from the grocer. (Thanks to more richly
Endowed consumer protection, itis les poisonous in
France than in Mali.) True, more babies get cow's
2
mil, but te brats of oth ich and poor dy
‘The added consumer is born when Ue bby es
forthe bottle: wien the oxgarisn it trsned to reach
fer milk from the grocer and to tira avay from the
tet tha tine defalea autonomous and creative
human aciny required. to. sake mans anivere
bloom, atrophies, Root of shingle or thatch, ile or
tin, are dplaced, by concrete. forthe few abd
ormgated. plastic. forthe many. Nether jungle
tmarhes nor ideological biases have prevented the
Poocend the vocal fortran ont tbe highway
the sche tne toads Ieading them in the word
— Fiaromlat_seplace-pricateThe mint stamps_
utall [ora ireasures and idols- Monty devalues what
‘cannot measure, The crisis, then, is the same forall:
the choice of more or less dependence upon industrial
‘commodities. More dependence means the rapid and
complete destruction of cultures which determine the
‘criteria for satisfying subsistence activities. Less means
the variegated lowering of eval in medern
cultures of intense activity. Although hard to imagine
for tho aleady accustomed to Hving imide the
supermarket, a structure diffrent only in name from
‘ward for idiots, the choice is essentially the same for
both rich and poor.
Presentday industrial society organizes life around
commodities. Our matket-intensive societies measure
material progress by the increase in the volume
and variety f commodities procrd, And ting
‘cur cue from this sector, we measure social progress
ty the daibution of seca to these commodien
2B“Eevnotnes hes bee! dewloped apron for the
takeover by langeerale connor predic! Sal
inna Becmschaed $0 plage -ogags hab
‘capped ‘disribution,* and. Welle eeonamice has
‘denied the. publc god wi opaltace We
humiliating optience ef the” pane in the’ schools
homial jail and aoylums ofthe United Stats and
‘ther western count
By duregarding all tradoolls to which no prictagis
stead, inducer bas erated ur wou ld
scape that is unfit or people mle they devour cack
Girona Caan CTE
which the-constant need for protection against: the
“tance renal of more things ad soe corti
Hip peneraed new depts ofdscratoaten, repre
Bu Initia, The ceablikinent-ocenintal aie
ovens sir has Farther wvcngcned this ene ft
hh concentated attention on uly indusal techn:
logy and, at bet on explain of inurl produc
tion by private owners thas questioned the depiction
tf naturel resources th ineonvenienos af pollution ah
Bet inualen of peru eet pcs ard
Machel fo fleet the ewtenmental impact the
irae of mance, ee the con of plarchon, we all
fo eet oe Seay thet the ven abe,
jmuluplichson of eepcitén qdscereeceaes ee
thea have frcbly subasiated Wandardioel package
for almost everything people formes did or made on
thdrows
For to, dads nov, aboot Sty Jengunges hare
died each year, half of ll shone wl spoken 1980
Pa
survive only as subjects for doctoral theses. And what
distinct languages do remain to witness the incompar
ably different ways of seeing, using, and enjoying the
world, now sound more and more alike, Conseious-
ness is colonized everywhere by imported labels. Yet,
even those who do worry about the lost of culeural
and genetic variety, or about the multiplication of
Jong-impact isotopes, do not advert to the irreversible
depletion of skills, stories, and senses of form. And this
progressive substitution of industrial goods and ser-
vices for useful but non-marketable values has been
the shared. goal of political factions and regimes
‘otherwise violently opposed to one another,
In this way, ever larger pieces of our lives are so
transformed that life itself comes to depend almost
exclusively.on the consumption of commodities sold
‘on, the world market. The United States corrupts its
{farmers to, provide grain to a regime which increas
ingly stakes its legitimacy on the ability to deliver
‘ever more grain, Of course, the two regimes allocate
resources by different. methods: here, by the wisdom
‘of pricing; there, by the wisdom of planners. But the
political, opposition between proponents of alternate
‘methods of allocation only masks the similar ruthless
disregard -of personal dignity and freedom by all
factions and parties.
Energy policy is a good example for the profound
identity in the world-views of the self.styled socialist
and the so-called capitalist supporters of the indus:
trial system. Possibly excluding such places as Cam-
bodia, about which T am uninformed, no governing
5
The De-Assification of Music - A Propagandist Magazine of One Number, Containing News of Importance To All Music Lovers, Especially To All Owners of Player Pianos (Carroll Brent Chilton)