Michael Dunkerley: The Jobless Economy? Computer Technology in the World of Work. - Review - book review

Michael Dunkerley: The Jobless Economy? Computer Technology in the World of Work

1996, Cambridge: Polity Press. 168 pages.

Whenever adjectives or nouns are made more dynamic, a hype is born. An example is the transformation of global into globalization in the 1980s. Since then, although the volume of world trade is still at about the same level as it was in the 1910s, globalization is said to rule the economies of the world. Similarly, the noun 'technology' is outdated: from now on, technologization is what really matters. As such, technological progress is anything but new: for example, manual teeth cleaning has been considered primitive behaviour for many a year. This is not what technologization is all about, however. What is new, is the pace of the technological development that moves, wavelike, through what are by now postmodern societies.

However, the postmodern society is not in the midst of a technological evolution, rather it is experiencing an information revolution. The little letter 'r' marks a world of differences. Technology futurists predict a societal revolution that will stretch beyond the imagination of Aldous Huxley and George Orwell. Future life will be completely technologized -- homework with the help of Internet, meeting people via video communication and shopping via Internet. In fact, one might already question whether this can be considered futuristic, as these forms of communication are already so popular. Plants will soon be fully robotized, with one robot monitoring another. By that time, going outside, leaving one's computer screen will have become a hobby, rather than a necessity. Only the physical transport of the deliveries ordered and paid for via Internet will still be an outdoor activity.

The British entrepreneur Michael Dunkerley has written a challenging book about the economic and social consequences of the information revolution. The main title of his book is significant: The Jobless Economy? Michael Dunkerley uses argumentation that changes the ? into an ! In the information society of tomorrow, the re-distribution of work will no longer be an issue -- after all, what does not exist, cannot be re-allocated. This is an attractive vision -- en masse on permanent sabbatical leave. Financing this utopia is the only issue that is waiting to be solved. Indeed, many economy observers argue that the Western world is in the middle of a re-shuffling process in the labour market. Modern information societies are a paradise for the highly educated information experts and exploiters. Low-skilled labour is on its way out.

This not only implies high unemployment among the low-skilled labour force, but this dual development also produces a widening gap between the 'haves' and the 'have-nots', with the expectancy of increasing poverty for the latter. Michael Dunkerley puts his case convincingly, using a long list of illustrative examples and statistics. For example, the UK's poorest decile has suffered from a 14.8 percent decrease in family income during the 1977-1988 period, whereas the richest British decile has gained 16.5 percent, on average, during the same period (and the top one percent, even more -- a sunny 49.8 percent!). The increase in inequality and poverty is particularly noticeable in the Anglo-Saxon world, especially in the United Kingdom and the United States, whereas much of continental Europe is plagued by persistently high unemployment rates (Gottschalk and Smeeding 1997) and, as Michael Dunkerley points out, this is just the beginning of the information revolution!. For him, this revolution is a power issue: ' New technology will find its way into the hands of rich and powerful organizations and individuals. They will use it to suit their own agendas. The majority of the world's people are neither rich nor powerful'.

The future for the world is a work desert, or, in Michael Dunkerley's words, a 'workless future'. The current Anglo-Saxon version of capitalism is counterproductive in this context, because the incentives and structures of capitalism serve the rich and powerful. With reference to the entrepreneurial myth, demand deficiency, multinational companies, international trade and haute finance, Michael Dunkerley argues that Anglo-Saxon capitalism makes matters worse. Therefore, what is needed is a 'paradigm shift'. In other words, a conditio sine qua non for a bright future is a fundamental re-thinking of the way in which modern societies deal with money, ownership and social responsibility. Voiced by an Anglo-Saxon entrepreneur, this is radical talk. A case in point is his condemnation of the modern enterprise. After reviewing up-to-date management techniques, varying from just-in-time logistics and employee empowerment to flat structuring and total quality management, Michael Dunkerley's message is clear: rather th an acting as a contributor to the solution, the modern enterprise is part of the problem. A revealing quote in this context is: 'The fortress company trusts no-one, not even its own workers. Everything has to be supervised and authorized' (cf. Gordon 1996). The labour force is the victim -- with fewer employees, more has to be produced. Modern enterprises' understatement for this is downsizing, a management hype that has terrorized the global business world since halfway through the 1980s (see, e.g., Wolman and Colamosca 1997). The current, and unprecedented, wave of mergers is another symptom of the modern struggle for dominance and power in the global market place. As Michael Dunkerley points out, for instance, GM has grown into the world's 24th economy in terms of sales, while the number of employees has been halved to about 400,000.