Fromm - The Revolution of Hope: Toward a Humanized Technology

Works by Erich Fromm published by American Mental Health Foundation Books
Beyond Freud: From Individual to Social Psychoanalysis
The Heart of Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil
The Pathology of Normalcy The Revolution of Hope: Toward a Humanized Technology

American Mental Health Foundation Inc Post Office Box 3
Riverdale New York 10471-0003

First published by Harper and Row, Publishers, New York in 1968 as volume XXXVIII of the World Perspectives planned and edited by Ruth Nanda Anshen. Copyright 1968, 1970 by Erich Fromm This publication follows the revised edition of 1970.

All rights reserved. No part of his book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the permission of The American Mental Health Foundation Inc and American Mental Health Foundation Books.

www.americanmentalhealthfoundation.org
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Fromm, Erich, 1900-1980.
The revolution of hope : toward a humanized technology / Erich Fromm. p. cm.
Originally published: 1st ed. New York : Harper & Row, 1968. (World perspectives ; v. 38). With new foreword. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN-13: 978-1-59056-183-6 (alk. paper)
ISBN-10: 1-59056-183-X (alk. paper)
1. Humanism. 2. TechnologyPhilosophy. 3. Civilization, ModernPhilosophy. 4. Hope. I. Title. B821.F72 2010
144dc22

I The Crossroads II Hope III. Where Are We Now and Where Are We Headed? 6 | Contents
IV What Does It Mean to Be Human? V Steps to the Humanization of VI Can We Do It?

As the present book is reissued, The American Mental Health Foundation celebrates its 86th anniversary. Organized in 1924, AMHF is dedicated to the welfare of people suffering form emotional problems, with a particular concern for individuals with special needs and the elderly. For many years, AMHF generally devoted its efforts to bettering quality of treatment and developing more effective methods, available even to low-income wage earners.

The major therapeutic advances and improved training methods are described in its existing publications: the series The Search for the Future. Two of these books are available on the AMHF Web site under the titles The Challenge for Group Psychotherapy (volume 1) and The Challenge for Psychoanalysis and Psychotherapy: Solutions for the Future (volume 2). Portions of these books are reprinted on its Web site in French and German, as they were published internationally (in addition to Italian editions), for a segment of the world community. These books were prepared by Dr. Stefan de Schill under the joint sponsorship of AMHF and The International Institute for Mental Health Research, Zurich and Geneva. Volume 3, written by Dr. de Schill and published by Prometheus Books in 2000, is entitled Crucial ChoicesCrucial Changes: The Resurrection of Psychotherapy.

In 2009, AMHF Books published The Violent Person by Dr. Raymond B. Flannery Jr. This is a book for professionals as well as anyone with a concern for, and an interest in, the mechanisms of human violence, stress at the breaking point (PTSD), and the workings of the brain.

8 | Publishers Foreword

Under the supervision and direction of Dr. William Van Ornum, AMHF Books is an exciting new venture. Within the mission and under the auspices of The American Mental Health Foundation, AMHF Books publishes new research as well as works by classic authors.

Erich Fromm (19001980) famously remains one of the authoritative voices of the 20th century, a time that witnessed unprecedented changes and upheavals in our understanding of the inner, as well as political, landscape of the human race. AMHF Books is proud to be the publisher of this world-renowned figure, one that has shaped our culture well into a new century. On the thirtieth anniversary of Fromms death and hundred and tenth of his birth, AMHF Books celebrates his visionary humanism by reissuing two of his books, The Revolution of Hope and The Heart of Man, and publishing two, Beyond Freud and The Pathology of Normalcy, for the first time.

None of the board members of The American Mental Health Foundation receives remuneration. Nevertheless, the costs of promoting research, preparing translations, and disseminating its findings and knowledge are high. For this reason, all sales of its books, donations, and legacy bequests constitute a meaningful contribution to the public good. We thank you for helping us improve the lives of our citizens.

www.americanmentalhealthfoundation.org

This book is a revised edition of the original version written almost two years ago. It was written during the McCarthy campaign for the Presidential nomination in which I participated actively and not without hope that McCarthy might be elected President, and that as a result of this the policy of the United States would change direction. This did not happen. The reasons for the failure are too complex to be dealt with here. Nevertheless when all is said, the fact remains that a man who was hardly known before, one who is the opposite of the typical politician, averse to appealing on the basis of sentimentality or demagoguery, truly opposed to the Vietnam War, succeeded in winning the approval and even the most enthusiastic acclaim of a large segment of the population, reaching from the radical youth, hippies, intellectuals, to liberals of the upper middle classes. This was a crusade without precedent in America, and it was something short of a miracle that this professorSenator, a devotee of poetry and philosophy, could become a serious contender for the Presidency. It proved that a large segment of the American population is ready and eager for Humanization.

McCarthys defeat, Nixons victory, the continuation of the Vietnam War, the increasing conservative-reactionary trend in the United States, have all weakened the spirit of hope that was so apparent in the summer of 1968; but they have by no means destroyed it. The demonstration of approximately 500,000 people who protested in Washington, D.C., against the war in Vietnam is only one symptom indicating that hope and the will for change are alive. The response in many quarters to the dangers resulting

10 | Preface
from ecological unbalance is another sign that concern for life is still strong among a large sector of the American public.

Nothing essential has to be changed for the republication of this book. Although it was primarily written with the American scene in mind, it deals with American society as one manifestation of the EuropeanNorth American technological societies, all of which face basically the same problems. Nevertheless I felt the need for a revision of the original edition and tried to improve the text in the last chapter by making some cuts and by attempting to express some ideas more clearly than I find they were expressed in the original version, which was written in somewhat of a hurry.

In contrast to my earlier works, this book was not primarily intended to develop new theoretical ideas but to restructure ideas I had dealt with earlier in a more academic fashion, appealing to the love for life (biophilia) that still exists in many of us. Only through full awareness of the danger to life can this potential be mobilized for action capable of bringing about drastic changes in our way of organizing society. Not that I am optimistic about the chances of success; but I believe that one cannot think in terms of percentages or probabilities as long as there is a real possibilityeven a slight onethat life will prevail.