Since human beings first fashioned primitive hand tools, technology has continuously transformed the way we life, the nature of our relationships with each other and the manner in which we interact with our environment and nature itself.

As we approach the 21^st Century, technology is all pervasive in industrial societies and is increasingly impacting itself upon developing countries. It is said that technology affects us from the cradle to the grave. All embracing though that may sound it is an underestimation of what is happening.

Technology now affects us before we are born and in many cases after we die. How and if we are conceived now frequently depends on technology. Once conceived, the fetus will be monitored and in some cases remedial surgery will be undertaken on the child even before it is born. At the other end of the scale even after death, part of us may exist as transplanted organs or as frozen sperm and embryos. It is now perfectly possible to produce offspring many years after one’s death. In consequence, the notion of what it is to be a mother, a father and "to have a family" is being daily re-defined.

Our ability to predict technological developments and the significance of its various forms is usually deeply flawed and even experts can be amusingly wide of the mark. Thus Charles Duell, commissioner, US Office of Patents declared in 1899: "Everything that can be invented has been invented". Also, Thomas Watson, IBM Chairman assessed in 1943: "I think there is a world market for maybe five computers".

This section will attempt to look at the transformations technology has brought in its wake and identify key features which may help us to set out policy options for further consideration. This section will look at some of the existing and emerging technologies and attempt to identify the way in which they can be creatively applied or modified in such a manner as to be supportive of the family in its many diverse forms throughout the world and in a broader sense be caring of humanity and our delicate eco-system [see Annex].

Technological developments have enabled us to extend our physical muscular power through the use of levers, hand operated lifting equipment to the present day massive earth moving equipment so that we can now, literally, move mountains. Our vision has been extended through the use of telescopes, electron microscopes and now satellites -–our eyes in space. Human calculating abilities have been extended by the use of equipment such as the abacus, Babbage’s Difference Engine and now powerful parallel processing computer devices which can carry out calculations in fractions of a second that previously would have taken thousands of years by traditional means if this were possible at all. The scope of travel was extended through the use of rafts, boats, animal power, wheeled transport and in the last hundred years air travel has developed at an astonishing rate and in an earth shrinking manner. There are now those who work in New York for four days a week and spend the weekends with their families in Europe. This new found mobility, even in its less dramatic forms, places great stress on traditional family relationships.

Although human beings created them, these technologies bring in their wake, many problems for society. Witness the congestion and pollution in cities resulting in large part from that giver of mobility the private car and the burgeoning automotive industry. Furthermore, at a more general level many individuals now feel diminished and displaced by the equipment they have created.

Those who introduce technological change and development often describe it as being synonymous with "progress". History shows however that it is not usually so straightforward. As the millenium draws precariously to its close one sees that technology is in fact a double edged affair. It produced on the one hand the beauty of Venice but on the other the hideousness of Chernobyl. It spawned the caring therapy of Rontgen’s X-rays but also the awesome destruction of Hiroshima. It resulted in the splendor of the Taj Mahal and the horrors of Bhopal.

A key requirement as we approach the 21^st Century is the capacity to identify the positive features of technology and build upon these whilst at the same time recognizing the negative features and eliminating or at least minimizing them.

Viewed historically, technological change has tended to make process (and work in general) capital, energy and chemical intensive rather than labor intensive. We replace people with machines. This is particularly well illustrated by looking at agriculture.

At earlier historical stages and even today in some parts of the world, agriculture and food production is the primary form of activity and is labor intensive. In the developed countries, food production has been transformed into factory-like work dominated by multinational corporations within the agro business. On the one hand, productivity has been dramatically increased whilst those employed in agriculture have been decimated. There are family owned farms in the UK that only twenty-five years ago employed sixty people and they are now being run with only five people. Rural family units are being fragmented in consequence.

A number of issues arise from this. Environmentalists hold that this has led to a massive destruction of the flora and fauna around us. Furthermore, there is a growing concern about the quality and even the safety of the food produced. BSE, E-Coli, and Salmonella have all recently been an issue in Europe. Rivers are polluted on an unprecedented scale.

In an employment sense, technology destroys jobs as well as creating them. The earlier forms of agricultural work were often harsh, backbreaking and very uncertain e.g. the Irish potato famine of the last century and today the consequences of drought and flooding in many parts of the world. On the other hand, such work in the past supported relatively close knit communities with family units playing a pivotal role in the production of food. Furthermore, cultural activities and religious holidays such as Spring and Harvest Festival were closely associated with the activities of sowing and reaping. Above all, there was a closeness to nature and an understanding of its cycles.

Recent years have seen a dramatic decline in traditional rural employment and a lack of any creative plans for alternative work. In consequence, there has been a hemorrhaging of young people from rural areas into the already overcrowded cities. This has resulted in the breakup of families and the decline of small towns and villages. Indeed an earlier EU report pointed out that unless creative steps were taken, some one hundred thousand small towns and villages would cease to be economically viable by the turn of the Century. This is already becoming an unfortunate reality.

Traditionally, the family unit in its diverse forms worldwide and with its many defects, was nonetheless the backbone of many rural societies. The cohesion, cultural continuity and generational solidarity it engendered is now severely threatened. The impact this is having on regional diversity, local culture and customs and even linguistic diversity is enormous. The impact on families is self evident. It is a worldwide phenomenon and in its diverse forms can be identified on native American reservations in the USA and Canada, in rural Ireland and most EU member states, in China on a massive scale, in large regions of the Indian sub-continent and in vast areas of Africa.

Huge though these problems are, it is already possible to detect, if only in embryo, ways of using technology, new organizational forms and economic policies which will firstly alleviate these problems and then gradually enhance and improve the quality of life of those involved. A few examples are cited below:

In Finland the "Village Action" programme was initiated a few years ago. In conjunction with local communities it uses new technologies and broadcasting to revitalize small villages and communities and this in turn has an enormous impact on families. A series of training broadcasts transmitted by Finnish Radio had two hundred thousand listeners. By 1992, two thousand eight hundred village committees had been formed covering more than two thirds of Finland’s villages and initiating projects mainly in the areas of culture, leisure, communication services, housing and economic envelopment. These involved some two thousand five hundred people directly and positively affected the lives of around five hundred thousand people.

The final outcome of Village Action is still not clear. However, experiments of this kind could be monitored and an inventory of positive options worldwide made available to the relevant agencies. Appropriately adapted variations may present interesting possibilities in other parts of the world.

In rural India agricultural land was an integral part of the family and its sustainability. It provided a basis of identity, a source of family cohesion and sustainable transmission from one generation to another. It was also a context for both the acquisition and transmission of social, cultural and technical skills.

Agricultural technology is now rapidly changing this situation from a means of sustaining the family to one of competitive agricultural industry within a market economy. These changes now require creative responses. The dissemination of basic information about simple low energy means of food production and its distribution could contribute significantly. Food processing could open up new markets and would be more profitable than the sale of the basic produce. Non agricultural forms of rural employment could also be facilitated using new technologies.

New small rural industries could be founded and the skills to develop and run these could be supported by forms of distance learning in conjunction with learning and earning projects. Information of this kind and also details of new forms of banking developed by women’s groups in rural areas, could be made available through two-way Village Information Centers. Furthermore, communication technologies could be used to set up new distribution systems where producers could communicate more directly with end users.

It is important to realize that the cultural, economic and even political impact of technology may be quite unforeseen. Throughout most of human history, performing arts were "live". That is to say the artist, (actor, singer or dancer) was in the same place and at the same time as the audience. A further limitation was the distance of the artist from the audience in order to ensure the largest audience but still allowing them to see and hear the whole performance. Quite elaborate technological solutions existed at that time – e.g. witness the astonishing acoustics of the Greek amphitheaters.

An apparently disconnected technology was to change all of that i.e. the ability to transmit and receive a signal over considerable distances a la Marconi. With the ability to make recordings, time as well as distance was separated from performance. If you had a radio, you could hear Caruso without attending an opera house and if you had a gramophone and a record to play on it you could hear him at whatever time of the day or night you wished – even after his death. Add to that films and then Hollywood and you could experience the dimension of grand vision as well.

An explosion of inventions ensued, leading to our present day multi-media cultural industries. Literally millions worldwide could witness the World Cup or a concert by the three tenors in real time. We can record the performances and relish the highlights over and over again in replays. The phenomenon of the Beatles and the huge commercial activities which surrounded them would not have been possible without exposure on the emerging media.

Positively used, there are clearly many advantages to all of this but there is also a downside. We are transformed in increasing numbers from participants into viewers. However, there is part of our culture and humanity which wishes (needs?) to actively participate and if we can’t actually do that, then we can at least be present. So we still talk of the thrill of live theatre or music and of the atmosphere when in the stadium at a major sporting event.

There are many subtle issues here for consideration by policy makers. For example, in the field of education, multi-media systems allow children to view flora and fauna in remote parts of the world. This is second order reality. It may supplement experience but is no substitute for the smell of the hay, the wriggle of worm caught in the child’s hand, or for having plants and wildlife explained in the context of the family, community or school. The old Chinese saying correctly reminds us:

"I hear and I forget;

I see and I remember;

I do and I understand."

Section II -  Impact of the Technological Revolution on the Family: Opportunities and Challenges in Developed Countries

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Family, perceived as a major institution, has remained a central issue in the recent evolution of Western society. In the overall transformation that has affected the way of life of millions of people, as well as their perceptions of social values, technology is deemed to have been a prime causal factor.