The Generative Fourth Industrial Revolution: Features, Affordances, and Implications

The current era of technology-enabled change is sometimes referred to as a fourth industrial revolution. A dominant narrative involves rapid technological progress, combinations of digital technologies, and productivity-enhancing industrial innovations. As technology has been rapidly advancing for decades, sometimes in combination, it is unclear what is new - if anything - about the current era. We address conceptual limitations of the dominant narrative by employing features and affordances to develop a new concept for the current era of technology-enabled change. The new concept involves the interconnectedness of three pillars (fused systems, enhanced machine functionality, integration infrastructure); suggests new managerial dilemmas; and implies significant new opportunities related to generativity. An overarching conclusion is that the generative fourth industrial revolution is at once an extension of the prior automating information revolution, and, an inflection point from the past.