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Technocracy
| Sociology Books 2008 |
Sociologyindex |
| The term "technocracy" was coined in
1919 and popularized in the mid 1930s. It is more a 21st Century term. In 1933, a new
movement named Technocracy was founded in the US. Its members advocate that engineers
should run a country, and that energy certificates should replace pay packets.
Technocracy emphasizes "hard" quantitative and econometric skills, like
programming and budgeting methodologies; in contrast, a cyberocracy may bring a new
emphasis on "soft" symbolic, cultural, and psychological dimensions of
policymaking and public opinion.
Bureaucrats command offices and channels. Technocrats command scientific expertise and
analytical skills.
Technocracy got public attention in the fall of 1932, when the Depression was near its
most severe point. During Depression and the economic and political turmoil, the
ostensible beginning of technocracy could hardly have been less noticeable.
There are times when technocracy is seen as a virtue because it is supposedly
subordinated to a President with the greatest democratic mandate.
There was a time when people worried that the information revolution and that the
relentless advance of technology and technocracy might mean that their lives would be run
by heartless computers, and government would be reduced to a "Hell of Administrative
Boredom." - Lowi. |
Books and Articles on Technocracy:
Beverly H. Burris
Technocracy at Work. Albany, N.Y.: SUNY Press, 1993.
"Braverman, Taylorism, and Technocracy," in Rethinking the Labor Process (M.
Wardell, T.Steiger and P. Meiksens, eds.). Albany, New York: SUNY Press, 1999
"Technocracy, Patriarchy, and Management," Pp. 61-77 in Men as Managers,
Managers as Men(D. Collinson and J. Hearn, Eds.). Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications,
1996."Technocracy and Management Control Systems," Accounting, Management &
InformationTechnology, (3):151-171, 1993 (with Jesse F Dillard)
"Technocracy and Gender in the Workplace," Social Problems, 36(2):165-180, April
1989
"Technocracy and the Transformation of Organizational Control," Social Science
Journal, 26(3):313-333, 1989."Technocracy and Work Organization," in David
Knights and Hugh Wilmott (eds.) Managing theLabour Process, Gower Publication, 1986, pp.
166-185.
"Educational Control in the United States: From Theocracy to Technocracy," Pp
5-25 in JamesA. Wilson (ed.), New Directions for Higher Education. San
Francisco:Jossey-Bass, 1982, (withWolf Heydebrand).
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