In an article in Horizon in 1965, Alvin Toffler coined a term ‘Future Shock’ which he later published as a full-fledged book to ‘describe the shattering stress disorientation that we induce in individuals by subjecting them to too much change in too short a time.’ The book is about the changing contours of the world and the transience of things in the lives of people, their sudden change towards the things and their nature of disposability towards them.

After years of the origin of the term, future shock seems to have been a perfect discovery and is, now, capable of reining an uncontrollable horse which could crush all the permanency and wash away it with the nuisance of transience in the social set ups of the world, be it Europe, America or some other third world area. The changing social set ups of the world people are changing at an alarming race. The transience or temporariness of things which people use is out of the dimension and could lead to a bigger problem than the Great Depression, if not controlled at all. To go to the basic levels people tend to use the disposable items more than those whose permanency would be lifelong. From cell phones to new PDAs, people keep on changing them without noticing the losses and their impermanence with them. Not only do people have a temporary relation with the things around them, they are also lacking in the human relations.

It was best of the times when there had to be a rendezvous and people would warmheartedly receive one another and meet the souls but now according to Toffler they are completely changed as people don’t have enough time to meet face to face. Toffler’s FUTURE SHOCK is completely based on the issues of permanence and transience and of changing natures of the people. It has much power tackling the behavioural changes and put an end to the much talked about: fast life. The conundrum of fast life according to Toffler will increase hundred folds within the coming years, which have proven correct and are now standing all the Berlin war dividing the lives and pure relations. The second most daunting challenge and the biggest future shock according to Toffler are of Migration. Thousands of people migrate to the cities leaving behind their ancestral homes. This behavioural change in the form of migration has also vented a volcano of change.

The ‘Future Shock’ is a peek through the window of future and it signals the reverse development which in other words could be understood as Shocking Future. 

(From RK Archives