Smart Machines

The entry reviews Shoshana Zuboff’s acclaimed work In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power, originally published in 1988 against the backdrop of the considerable technological changes that have occurred over the last two decades. The core themes of the book dealing with the impact of information technology on the workplace are highly relevant even today while the analytic paths Zuboff pursued seem to hold considerable promise in approaching key issues raised by the expansion of information technology in social and economic life, and designing better systems.