软技术 Soft Technology

Table of Contents
Preface to the English Edition: Theodore Gordon
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter One: What is Technology?
Chapter Two: Historical Antecedents of Soft Technology
Chapter Three: Soft Technology and Technological Competitiveness
Chapter Four: Soft Technology and Innovation
Chapter Five: Soft-Tech Industries
Chapter Six: Soft Technology and the Fourth Generation of Technology Foresight
Postscript: The Principles for Development in the Twenty-first Century - Harmony, Balance, and Coexistence
About The Author
Bibliography
Front & Back Cover: Hazel Henderson Rinaldo S. Brutoco and Karamjit S Gill

Preface to the English Edition: Theodore Gordon
Eight years ago I wished Professor Jin good luck in implementing the new discipline she called “soft technology.” The need for solutions to problems in this non-physical domain was clear enough, but starting new disciples is difficult and rarely successful. We read in the history of science about the cool reception given to new ideas that challenge old precepts, the fate of most of the scientists that propose those new ideas, and finally, occasionally, the rallying around the new ideas that are destined to survive. Is it too early to consider whether the notion of “soft technology” has taken root?

Professor Jin defines soft technology as the “knowledge derived from the social sciences, non-natural sciences and non-scientific (traditional) knowledge to solve various practical problems.” It is that sphere of technology outside of the physical, beyond the machines and tools of physical technology. It is, she says, focused on human thought, not things, and is the realm of ‘ideology, emotion, values, worldview, individual and organizational behaviors, as well as human society’.

Soft technology is probably older that hard technology, but hard technology is more systematically codified and understood. Hard technologies exist because of invention but the invention process itself and the uses made of the hard technologies come from the soft side. Moral and ethical considerations are not a part of hard technology. How often have we heard that ‘technology cannot itself be evil, the evil lies in the way it’s used’? Hard technology relies on laws of nature and information about how to do things; soft technology falls back on the inner self and ancient epistemologies.

Both hard and soft technologies involve knowledge systems, invention, and creativity; both are important because they affect the human condition but they operate on vastly different wavelengths.

The Beijing Academy of Soft Technology was established in 2002 as a virtual institute; it now employing several full time staff and several part time members, who contribute depending on the project’s need.

Professor Jin and her colleagues have written several books on soft technology and a few of the issues it addresses.

The Institute has contracted with the Beijing Academy of Science and Technology, on future studies; with National Academy of Soft Power of Peking University, and with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

Soft Technology as a new discipline was placed on the agenda of eleventh plan (2005-2010) for important research field of Institute of Quanti-Economics & Techno-Economics, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences

Over 20 papers dealing with soft technology topics have been published and delivered in symposia on topics that have included; the role of Soft Technology in: the new economy, technology foresight, innovation, socio－economic development, trends in the service Industry, technological progress and evolution, globalization, technological competitiveness of developing countries, strategic management and institutional innovation of China’s coal-bed methane industry, the knowledge economy, the robot policy of China,

Soft technology has become international. In many countries, some scholars are using soft-technology and in U.S., Austria, Brazil and Malaysia have expressed interest in establishing a soft technology innovation system framework.

Professor Jin has lectured in a dozen countries and 30 universities, corporations, and conferences about the theory and application of the soft technology, for instance she was invited as a speaker for the First ‘Festival of Thinkers’ with ten Nobel Laureates in 2005; and to the International conference of Innovation management in Brazil in 2009;

One can think of dozens of necessary soft technology inventions. Consider inventing a way to protect intellectual property that rewards the inventor but does not withhold the fruits of the invention from people who need it but cannot afford it. Consider a soft technology for encouraging the use of futures research in decision-making or the development of a new decision science that goes beyond economic cost benefit and includes intuition, explicit risk-taking, artificial intelligence and neuropsychiatry. How can conflict resolution be improved? How can old ethnic hatreds be tamed? Or consider how, in this modern world, children, CEOs, clergy and politicians can learn values and moral behavior. These are worthy soft technology research projects.

There are a few other prospective soft technology inventions that deserve some thought. Science and the hard technologies that flow from it have contributed to our material world for better or worse, improved health, lengthened life and, despite the poverty gap, increased abundance for most people. But on the horizon are possible developments flowing from science that seem threatening and give us cause to pause. Further, science left to its own mechanisms, seems unlikely to provide solutions to pressing global problems. In a nutshell, how can science help capture the best, and avoid the worst, that the future has to offer? Or to put it a different way, how can soft technology help shape science to make life better and less risky for all?

Not many of these problems and opportunities have yet been addressed fully by the fledgling discipline, but the road ahead is becoming clearer. More is possible, more is needed, but by any measure, there has been a good start.

Theodore Jay Gordon is a Senior Research Fellow for the Millennium Project. He started The Futures Group in 1971 and is the author of five books and hundreds of papers dealing with topics associated with the future, space, scientific and technological developments and global issues. He was a consultant to RAND, an early contributor to the use of the Delphi method and the inventor of several futures research techniques.

Back cover by Hazel Henderson
Professor Jin’s new book, Global Technological Change: From Hard Technology to Soft Technology, is a powerful re-conceptualization of technological options and innovation management, which can help steer societies in assessing technologies for the 21st century.
As Zhouying Jin correctly points out: in emerging knowledge societies, the "soft" technologies are drivers of physical "hardware" technologies. These soft technologies include management, organizational design, education for creativity and entrepreneurship, good governance, prudent regulation, patent systems, efficient banking as well as fostering systems thinking, ecological and cultural balance. This book is a major intellectual advance that can help clarify human choices for decades to come.

Hazel Henderson, Advisory Council Member, US Office of Technology Assessment, National Science Foundation, National Academy of Engineering (1974-1980); President, Ethical Markets Media (USA and Brazil); member, Club of Rome.

Back cover Karamjit S Gill
This volume indicates that the complex problems we are facing in the 21st century can only be solved by a balance between‘yin-yang’environment, between the hard technology (machine-centred) and the soft technology (human-centred). This concept is invaluable as it conveys a new perspective of the assumptions about the relationships between technological innovation, institutional innovation, as well as of the gap between the developed and developing countries at the turn of the new millennium.

Karamjit S Gill, Editor, AI& Society: Journal of Human-Centred Systems

Front cover quote by Rinaldo S. Brutoco
This book is the most thoroughly comprehensive look at technology from a Western and Chinese perspective that I have ever had the privilege to read. The sweep of Prof. Jin’s examination is matched by the breadth of her scholarship. Her development of “Soft Technology” as a concept which can bridge the divide between our planetary science and our cultural consciousness is a unique contribution to our understanding of the place where science meets awareness. Her work deserves to be studied in careful detail for the insight it might provide us, particularly in the West, of how to appropriately empower Eastern cultures to be fully equal global partners with the Western Industrial communities based upon Harmony, Balance and Equality.

Rinaldo S. Brutoco is President of the World Business Academy

Preface by Theodore Jay Gordon
In this remarkable and groundbreaking book, Professor Jin begins the arduous process of organizing a new discipline: soft technology. We live daily with hard technology: it is the domain of tools, machines and equipment. Professor Jin defines it as the “skills, the tools, and rules that are employed by humans to alter, accommodate to and manage nature for human survival and development”. It is about things. It delivers the elements of our material life.
The new discipline she describes in this book represents the rest of the technological universe; she defines soft technology as “knowledge derived from the social sciences, non-natural sciences, and non-scientific (traditional) knowledge to solve various practical problems.” It is, she says, focused on human thought, not things, and is the realm of “ideology, emotion, values, worldview, individual and organizational behaviors, as well as human society.”
Soft technology is probably older, but hard technology is more systematically codified and understood. Hard technologies exist because of invention; but the invention process itself and the uses made of the hard technologies come from the soft side. Moral and ethical considerations are not a part of hard technology. How often have we heard that “technology cannot itself be evil, the evil lies in the way it’s used?” Hard technology relies on laws of nature and information about how to do things; soft technology falls back on the inner self and ancient epistemology.
Both hard and soft technologies involve knowledge systems; both are important because they affect the human condition, but they operate on vastly different wavelengths.
One can think of dozens of needed soft technology inventions. Consider inventing a way to protect intellectual property that rewards the inventor but does not withhold the fruits of the invention from people who need it but cannot afford it. Consider a soft technology for encouraging the use of futures research in decision-making, or the development of a new decision science that goes beyond economic cost benefit and includes intuition, explicit risk taking, artificial intelligence and neuro-psychiatry. How can conflict resolution be improved? How can old ethnic hatreds be tamed? Or consider how, in this modern world, children, CEO’s, clergy, and politicians, can learn values and moral behavior. These are worthy soft technology research projects.
There are a few other prospective soft technology inventions that deserve some thought. Science and the hard technologies that flow from it, have contributed to our material world for better or worse, improved health, lengthened life, and despite the poverty gap, increased abundance for most people. But on the horizon are possible developments flowing from science that seem threatening and give us pause. Further, science left to its own mechanisms, seems unlikely to provide solutions to pressing global problems. So, in a nutshell, how can science help capture the best and avoid the worst that the future has to offer? Or to put it in a different way, how can soft technology help shape science to make life better and less risky for all?
It is probably unfair to pose such difficult challenges to a new discipline. But the ease with which we can find jobs for it to do, illustrates its potential importance. God speed.
Theodore Jay Gordon
October 2002

Mr. Theodore Jay Gordon is a Senior Research Fellow for the Millennium Project of the American Council for the United Nations University. He started The Futures Group in 1971 and is the author of five books and hundreds of papers dealing topics associated with the future, space, and scientific and technological developments and global issues. He was a consultant to RAND, an early contributor to the use of the Delphi method, and the inventor of several futures research techniques.