Illich, Ivan

Ivan Illich, a priest turned philosopher, is a thinker of political ecology and an important figure in the critique of industrial society. In 1951, after studying theology and philosophy at the Gregorian University in Rome, he moved to the United States and worked as an assistant to the pastor of a Puerto Rican parish in New York. Between 1956 and 1960, he was vice-rector of the Catholic University of Puerto Rico. In 1966 he co-founded the Center for Intercultural Documentation (CIDOC) in Cuernavaca, Mexico. After its closure in 1976, Illich returned to Europe and taught early medieval history in Bremen, Germany. His writings on the school institution, energy policy, the over-tooling of industrialised societies and over-medicalisation have had a universal influence, provoking fruitful debates in many countries.