ABSTRACT
Small is Beautiful has sold over four million copies and remains a bestseller. Small is Beautiful was published, there have been enormous changes in technology, in raw materials, in production techniques, information systems and product development. The task was to establish a tolerable basis of existence for the 80 per cent through an intermediate technology aimed at improving the productivity of traditional technologies, which were often in a state of stagnation or decay. Intermediate technology is a relative term: a technology that stands somewhere between what is known - the traditional technology and the modern. Thus in Africa, animal traction, falling half way between the hoe and the tractor, could be seen as an intermediate technology. Some critics began to debunk the notion of 'technology choice', arguing that there is usually only one way of efficiently and economically pursuing an activity, only one readily available choice that makes sense in a given situation.
