Module 3.1 Capitalism and Technology

(Development in progress)

How does technology affect employment? How will new forms of surveillance capitalism affect politics, economics, and society?

Introduction

A few paragraphs about the subject… 

Learning objectives

• • Understand engineering interactions with the economy
• • Understand engineering interactions with society, resilience
• • Understand engineering interactions with health, safety, and law

Required reading (372)

This is the stuff students must read; not more than an hour or two for the 372 class

Other links and references (374)

• • Kunstler (2012) technology won’t solve everything; that’s just wishful thinking
• • Bratton (2016) software and sovereignty
• • Brown and Campbell (2002)
• • Ford (2015) tech advances as disruptor
• • Howard (2015) Internet of things can lock us up
• • Zuboff (2019) Surveillance capitalism, harvesting behavioural surplus, nudging behaviour
• • contrasting goals of capitalist and authoritarian models of tech management—Zuboff (2019) maximum profit vs max “social good” – if social good doesn’t sound scary, see Scott (1998) Seeing Like a State (and maybe Rummell, Power Kills) on the other hand blind destruction for profit and escalating inequality unconstrained by civil society doesn’t seem much better
• • Wittes (2015) ch. 4, technology, states, and the social order; ch. 8 options for domestic governance; ch. 9 options for international governance… 

Presentations

Lecture 1

A short description of what is included

Link to the slides

Lecture 2

A short description of what is included

Link to the slides

Seminar (for POE374, optional for POE372)

Key question in the seminar