Digital depression : information technology and economic crisis / Dan Schiller.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Schiller, Dan, 1951- author.

Series:

Geopolitics of information.

The geopolitics of information

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Information technology.

Economic policy.

Economic development--Technological innovations.

Economic development.

Global Financial Crisis, 2008-2009.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (377 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Urbana, Illinois ; Chicago, Illinois : University of Illinois Press, 2014.

Language Note:

English

Summary:

"A contradiction coils through the political economy: that today's financial and economic crisis began in the historical heartland of advanced information and communications technology (ICTs): the United States. It was not supposed to turn out this way. ICTs were to be the source of economic rejuvenation and uplift. Instead, the U.S., the historical driver of digital systems and services, originated what has become the deepest and most prolonged slump since the 1930's. Today, a technological revolution is wrapped up inside an economic collapse: a digital depression. Whence did it come? Where are we headed? In Digital Depression, Dan Schiller continues his work on how networked systems and ICTs have transformed the global capitalist system. He focuses on the crisis tendencies of capitalism and confronts the contradictory matrix of technological revolution and economic stagnation that constitutes the contemporary political economy. After demonstrating digital technology's central role in the global political economy and connecting it to the rise of worldwide financial and military networks, Schiller surveys the digital communication industry before turning to the geopolitical significance of digital communication with an especially important insight on the U.S. policy apparatus and the rise of China as an oppositional force. Digital Depression demonstrates that the forces at the heart of capitalism--exploitation, commodification, and inequality--along with militarization and surveillance are ongoing and accelerating within the networked political economy"-- Provided by publisher.

"The financial crisis of 2007-08 shook the idea that advanced information and communications technologies (ICTs) as solely a source of economic rejuvenation and uplift, instead introducing the world to the once-unthinkable idea of a technological revolution wrapped inside an economic collapse. In Digital Depression, Dan Schiller delves into the ways networked systems and ICTs have transformed global capitalism during the so-called Great Recession. He focuses on capitalism's crisis tendencies to confront the contradictory matrix of a technological revolution and economic stagnation making up the current political economy and demonstrates digital technology's central role in the global political economy. As he shows, the forces at the core of capitalism--exploitation, commodification, and inequality--are ongoing and accelerating within the networked political economy"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Cover

Title

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction: A Contradictory Moment

Part I: Digital Capitalism's Ascent to Crisis

1. Network Connectivity and Labor Systems

2. Networked Production and Reconstructed Commodity Chains

3. Networked Financialization

4. Networked Militarization

Part II: The Recomposition of Communications

5. The Historical Run-Up

6. Web Communications Commodity Chains

7. Services and Applications

8. The Sponsor System Resurgent

9. Growth amid Depression

Part III: Geopolitics and Social Purpose

10. A Struggle for Growth

11. A "New Foreign Policy Imperative

12. Taking Care of Business: The Internet at the U.S. Commerce Department

13. Beyond a U.S.-centric Internet?

14. Accumulation and Repression

15. From Geopolitics to Social and Political Struggle

Notes

Index.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Includes index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780252080326

0252080327

9780252096716

0252096711

OCLC:

891719703