Cornelius Castoriadis and Jacques Ellul on the dilemmas of technical autonomy.

This article examines the convergences between Cornelius Castoriadis’ onto-historical critique of autonomous technology and Jacques Ellul’s socio-historical analysis of la technique, highlighting their shared concern about the technicist capitalist imaginary’s threat to human autonomy and self-determination. Castoriadis critiques the “imaginary of the unlimited extension of rational mastery,” emphasizing the ecological and anthropological destruction wrought by autonomous techno-science, and advocates for democratic self-limitation through radical political ecology as a means to counteract this. Ellul’s analysis centers on the principle of efficiency as the defining characteristic of modern technology, leading to the de-symbolization of culture and an ethics of non-power that calls for voluntary self-restraint to resist technological domination. While Castoriadis envisions political ecology and democratic self-limitation as practical responses, Ellul proposes a spiritual and ethical stance of transgression against technological expansion, with both thinkers underscoring the necessity of limiting technological growth to preserve human freedom and societal well-being.