The global history of techniques has emerged as a new field, and one that has enjoyed a strong scientific and organisational momentum over the past fifteen years. Collective works and the first recently-published reports attest to the possibility of drawing the initial lessons from a multi-scalar approach. This approach is resolutely critical of ethnocentrism and concerned with restoring the complexity of technical worlds over the long term, in contrast to the universal histories that have long dominated this field of study.