economist and author of small is beautiful (1973). argued for intermediate and appropriate technology: human-scale systems, tools scaled to the human body and the local community, not to corporate ambition or abstract efficiency.

small is not a size but a relationship. schumacher's question: what is the appropriate scale for this tool, this context? not: how do i scale this to reach everyone? the second question produces platforms. the first produces tools i can actually use and maintain alone.

close intellectual neighbour to ivan illich. both writing in 1973, both asking whether the tools of industrial society were actually serving the people who used them. sufficiency is the direct inheritance.

schumacher college