Engineering as a Social Enterprise


Book Description

How is society influenced by engineering and technology? How in turn does society shape engineering and technology? This book from the National Academy of Engineering explores ways in which technology and society form inseparable elements in a complex sociotechnical system. The essays in this volume are based on the proposition that many forces move and shape engineering, technology, culture, and society. Six specialists both inside and outside the field of engineering offer views on how engineering responds to society's needs and how social forces shape what engineers do and what they can achieve.







Mastering a New Role


Book Description

This book examines the changing character of commercial technology development and diffusion in an integrated global economy and its implications for U.S. public policies in support of technological innovation. The volume considers the history, current practice, and future prospects for national policies to encourage economic development through both direct and indirect government support of technological advance.




Creating the Computer


Book Description

The development of the first electronic digital computers in the 1940s signaled the beginning of a new and distinctive type of industry—an industry marked by competition through innovation, and by the large percentage of revenues spent on research and development. Written as a companion volume to Targeting the Computer: Government Support and International Competition, this comprehensive volume provides a new understanding to the complex forces that have shaped the computer industry during the past four decades. Kenneth Flamm identifies the origins of technologies important to the creation of computers and traces the roots of individual technologies to the specific research groups and programs responsible for major advances. He evaluates the impact of these innovations on industrial competition and argues that the emergence of specialization and product differentiation in the 1950s and the compatibility and standards in the mid-1960s were key factors defining this competition. Flamm also identifies the various market strategies adopted in later decades to challenge an industry leader, strategies linked to the entry and exit of individual firms. In addition to the effects of technology and internal industry developments, international competition and national policies on technology, trade, and investment shaped the evolution of this new industry. Flamm documents the role of government support for technology in the United States, Western Europe, and Japan and describes the critical technological and economic links between national and international markets. Finally, he links these strategies, technological trends, and national policies to one another and shows how they continue to influence current developments in the computer industry.




The Artificial Heart


Book Description

A significant medical event is expected in 1992: the first human use of a fully implantable, long-term cardiac assist device. This timely volume reviews the artificial heart program-and in particular, the National Institutes of Health's major investment-raising important questions. The volume includes: Consideration of the artificial heart versus heart transplantation and other approaches to treating end-stage heart disease, keeping in mind the different outcomes and costs of these treatments. A look at human issues, including the number of people who may require the artificial heart, patient quality of life, and other ethical and societal questions. Examination of how this technology's use can be targeted most appropriately. Attention to achieving access to this technology for all those who can benefit from it. The committee also offers three mechanisms to aid in allocating research and development funds.




The Age of Surveillance Capitalism


Book Description

The challenges to humanity posed by the digital future, the first detailed examination of the unprecedented form of power called "surveillance capitalism," and the quest by powerful corporations to predict and control our behavior. In this masterwork of original thinking and research, Shoshana Zuboff provides startling insights into the phenomenon that she has named surveillance capitalism. The stakes could not be higher: a global architecture of behavior modification threatens human nature in the twenty-first century just as industrial capitalism disfigured the natural world in the twentieth. Zuboff vividly brings to life the consequences as surveillance capitalism advances from Silicon Valley into every economic sector. Vast wealth and power are accumulated in ominous new "behavioral futures markets," where predictions about our behavior are bought and sold, and the production of goods and services is subordinated to a new "means of behavioral modification." The threat has shifted from a totalitarian Big Brother state to a ubiquitous digital architecture: a "Big Other" operating in the interests of surveillance capital. Here is the crucible of an unprecedented form of power marked by extreme concentrations of knowledge and free from democratic oversight. Zuboff's comprehensive and moving analysis lays bare the threats to twenty-first century society: a controlled "hive" of total connection that seduces with promises of total certainty for maximum profit -- at the expense of democracy, freedom, and our human future. With little resistance from law or society, surveillance capitalism is on the verge of dominating the social order and shaping the digital future -- if we let it.




Winning in High-Tech Markets


Book Description

Why are so many U.S. firms performing poorly in high-technology industries like consumer electronics & semiconductors? Why are they being outperformed in the fast-growing, dynamic, short-cycle-time industries that they themselves pioneered? Why are some firms-foreign & domestic-better than others at competing through technology? And what can governments do to promote industrial competitiveness? Joseph Monroe argues that the answers to these questions can be found in the practices & behavior of general management. Monroe's investigation into the role of general management in building competitive advantage on the basis of technology highlights three U.S. successes in high-tech markets. GE Medical Systems, Motorola Communications, & Corning are among a small number of U.S. businesses that have built global leadership in precisely the kinds of high-tech markets in which many U.S. firms have been outperformed by their Japanese counterparts. Monroe explores the managerial strategies, practices, & philosophies behind their success, & how these influenced, & were influenced by, technology development. His conclusion that successful firms are often those whose corporate strategies are shaped by technology opportunities is striking in its divergence from the conventional wisdom about American managerial practice & the role that government can play in promoting high-technology strength.







Government Policy and Program Impacts on Technology Development, Transfer, and Commercialization


Book Description

In recent decades, government-funded technologies have produced radar, microwave ovens, modern cell phone systems, the Internet, new materials for aircraft and motor vehicles, and new medical instrumentation. This first-of-its-kind book examines how access to technology is affected by government policies and government-sponsored programs. Government Policy and Program Impacts on Technology Development, Transfer, and Commercialization: International Perspectives provides an easy-to-read overview of the field and several studies serving as examples to guide government policymakers and private sector decision makers. This forward-looking book also forecasts the potential impacts of government regulation upon the field and presents provocative discussions of the ethical implications of the cross-cultural and cross-national challenges facing technologically developed nations in the global economy. This book reviews this broad field by first providing an overview of the goals of government technology policies and programs as well as of generic types of government technology programs. Next, it presents carefully selected studies that illustrate the potential impacts of government decisions upon marketing constraints, industry acceptance of regulatory requirements, economic development, gross domestic product, and the choices firms make when it comes to location, competitiveness, product development, and other factors. The final chapters explore ethical considerations from a global perspective. These chapters also explore the implications of these considerations in relation to the success of governmental and private sector technology transfer and commercialization programs. The macromarketing perspective taken by the contributors serves to ground the impacts of government technology policies and programs in practical implications for economic development, business productivity, and quality of life. The contributors to this unique collection share their expertise on government sponsorship of technology research, the impact of government regulation upon technology marketing and economic development, the effects of government policies on business practices, intellectual property rights, and much more. Government Policy and Program Impacts on Technology Development, Transfer, and Commercialization shows how evolving technology and government policy changes have affected: the commercialization of musicnew media, piracy problems, consumer choices and costs, and changes in the radio and concert promotion industries the adoption of new household technology licensure requirements for telemedicinewith an essential overview of telemedicine plus examinations of relevant governmental regulations and potential applications patents, copyrights, trademarks, licensing, and proprietary information scrap tire disposalnew alternatives for a chronic waste disposal problem food product development state-owned enterpriseswith a case study illustrating how a stagnant state-owned company quickly evolved into China’s leading firm in the textile machinery field




Conflict and Cooperation in National Competition for High-Technology Industry


Book Description

This unique volume contains a powerful set of recommendations on issues at the center of international discussions on investment, trade, and technology policy. They take into account the globalization of industrial activity and the special characteristics of high-technology industries while recognizing the continued policy role of national governments. The book identifies the rationale for promotional measures for high-technology industries, delineates sources of friction among the leading industrial countries, and proposes policies to enhance international cooperation and strengthen the multilateral trading regime. This volume also examines the factors driving collaboration among otherwise competing firms and national programs, highlights the need to develop principles of equitable public and private international cooperation, and emphasizes the linkage between investment, government procurement, and other trade policies and prospects for enhanced international cooperation.