Political Machines: Governing a Technological SocietyTechnology assumes a remarkable importance in contemporary political life. Today, politicians and intellectuals extol the virtues of networking, interactivity and feedback, and stress the importance of new media and biotechnologies for economic development and political innovation. Measures of intellectual productivity and property play an increasingly critical part in assessments of the competitiveness of firms, universities and nation-states. At the same time, contemporary radical politics has come to raise questions about the political preoccupation with technical progress, while also developing a certain degree of technical sophistication itself.In a series of in-depth analyses of topics ranging from environmental protest to intellectual property law, and from interactive science centres to the European Union, this book interrogates the politics of the technological society. Critical of the form and intensity of the contemporary preoccupation with new technology, Political Machines opens up a space for thinking the relation between technical innovation and political inventiveness.> |
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activity air quality analysis anti-political argued artefacts become boundaries Bruno Latour Brussels Callon centre chapter circulation Community complex concern connections contemporary contestation critical cultural debate demonstration DG-XIIA distinction Donna Haraway economic effects environment environmental Europe European Commission European institutions European Parliament European Union example existence EXOSAT Exploratorium forms Foucault George Monbiot global harmonisation historical idea importance industrial innovation instruments intellectual property rights interactive invention involved laboratories Latour London Majone Marilyn Strathern measurement ment Michel Callon monitoring MOT test movement nation-state neo-liberalism Newbury objects Old Kent Road organisation particular patent political action pollution possible problem production programme protestors regulation relation remote sensing Schaffer science and technology Science Museum scientific and technical scientists social Southwark Southwark Council space specific standardisation standards Strathern technical devices technical practices techniques technological society technological zones territorial tion