ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to enrich the ongoing debate in the field by articulating an integrated framework for Appropriate Technology. The sine qua non of the integrated framework is that Appropriate Technology be viewed as an innovation strategy aimed at ensuring that technological means are compatible with their context, where "context" is taken to include social and political factors and associated normative goals. Psychosocial includes the ethical goals, political framework, economic structures, social institutions, philosophical perspectives, ideological commitments, aesthetic sensibilities, personal aspirations or psychic needs of people. The features of Appropriate Technology which form the foundation of the integrated framework are that it is a mode of technology-practice characterized by an innovation strategy aimed at achieving a good technological fit. The combination of systems thinking and the simultaneous problem solving strategy leads to an integrated assessment of human and environmental problems. The integrated problem solving which is part of Appropriate Technology opens up a wide scope of resources for problem solving.
