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The control revolution: Technological and economic origins of the information society
Book reviews one marketing
any new product. Simlarly, the chapters on planning techniques, and on the role of computers in productivity, could be read by anyone with a general interest in management for any purpose. However, the reader with an information science background will need to read the first chapter very carefully, particularly the definitions of information management and information resource management. In effect, ‘information resources’ are defined as the technologicul resources which act as ‘information conduits’: Information management is the proccss of identifying, dclining. collccting, h,toring, processing. protecting. and
distributing
informntion.
deals with the information Information
resource
It
content.
manage-
mcnt is the process of architcctlng
[Gc] and managing the technological infrastructure
of the firm. It &ala with information conduit. which is II technic:11 issue.
Provided one accepts these definitions the rest of the book will be clear, but if one views information resources as the various categories of documents and one could be rather other media, puzzled by the attention given to managing computer resources. TDW
J. A. Beniger
The control rc~volution: Td~nologicd und economic origins of thr information society. London: Harvard University Press, 1986. x + 493 pp. ISBN 0 674 1698.5 9. f21.25. This is scholarship at its coruscating best - a brilliant and original exposition of the genesis of the information society. Beniger swoops across a huge intellectual terrain highlighting the ley lines of socio-technical development which by the tail-end of the nineteenth century have converged at a point he christens the Control Revolution. The central thesis of this mammoth work is summed up in the following introductory statement:
242
Until
the
Industrial
Revolution,
even the largest and most developed economies
ran
pace, with
literally
at human
processing
hanccd only slightly
speeds
en-
hy draft animals
and by wind and water power,
;Ind
with
cor-
system
control
respondingly
incrcascd
by modest hurcaucra-
tic structures.
By
far the greatest
effect of industrialization. perspective, society’s system. period
was
entire
to
from this speed
material
thereby precipitating in which
formation
innovations
processing
up
a
processing
and
a in incom-
munication behind plication
technologies lagged those of cncrgy and its apto
manufacturing
and
transportation. He identifies three primary dynamics which together account for the Control Revolution, beginning in the USA around the end of the nineteenth century: The coevolution of energy utilization, processing speed and control. The gains from control technology that accrued through increasing reliability and predictability The increasing control required of control technologies themselves. This crisis of control arose for the following reason: ‘So long as the energy used to process and move material throughputs did not much exceed that of human labor, individual workers in the system could provide the information processing required for its control’ (p. 427). Changes in the nature of the material economy (goods production, processing and distribution) during the eighteenth century created a need for improvements in man’s ability to process and communicate information. More sophisticated control mechanisms were required to sustain rapid increases in the throughput and distribution of goods to scattered markets. As the economy shifted from local segmented markets to increasingly higher levels of organization. the need for more effective information processing and communication capability grew apace. This, in Beniger’s view. contributed to the early maturation of the tertiary and quaternary sectors (e.g., banks, the postal service, public education,
insurance, chambers of commerce). Without the development of these sectors, the process of industrialization would not, he argues, have been possible-a dramatic reinterpretation of the historical sequence popularized by authors such as Daniel Bell. The Control Revolution which Beniger describes can be summarized as ‘a complex of rapid changes in the technological and economic arrangements by which information is processed, and communicated, and through which formal or programmed decisions might effect societal control’ (p. vi). And why is information so important? ‘The answer must be sought in the nature of all living systems ultimately in the relationship between information and control. Life itself implies control, after all, in individual cells and organisms no less than in any other purposive system’ (p. vi). This leads the author to look at purposiveness and control in-theround. His analysis begins with an ambitious foray into sociobiology and the nature of human life, socialization and systemic organization. He proceeds to identify four major control revolutions - four levels of control in the course of sophistication natural history, each of which (life, culture, bureaucracy, technology) has been characterized by an extension and refinement of the principle of Beniger’s information processing. scholarship carries us from a discussion of DNA molecules encoded with genetic programming, through semiotics and the role of ritual in society, before an extended analysis of control and distribution in pre-industrialized and industrialized economies. Throughout, Beniger sustains the elaborate thread of his thesis and en route provides imaginative insights into the nature of entropy. systems and the socioand information, economic significance of. inter aliu. auctions, jobbers, railroads, advertising, market research, radio. factory office machinery and automation, data processing technology. Despite the many exquisitely wrought subthemes and illustrations, the reader never loses sight of the whole and is led with confidence and elegance towards the central conclusion, namely,
Book reviews
that the information society has not resulted from recent changes, ‘but rather from increases in the speed of material processing and of flows through the material economy that began more than a century ago’ (p. 435). The information society is a fashion-
able construct which has spawned a literature of no mean proportion. The size of this corpus is. however, inversely related to its analytic quality and it is to be hoped that the responsible pamphleteers will pause sufficiently from their endeavours to ingest the fruits of Beniger’s labours. ‘The con-
trol revolution’
will certainly not be the last word on the emerging information society, but the sweeping synthesis it offers will not easily be matched. R. Crotlin
243
any new product. Simlarly, the chapters on planning techniques, and on the role of computers in productivity, could be read by anyone with a general interest in management for any purpose. However, the reader with an information science background will need to read the first chapter very carefully, particularly the definitions of information management and information resource management. In effect, ‘information resources’ are defined as the technologicul resources which act as ‘information conduits’: Information management is the proccss of identifying, dclining. collccting, h,toring, processing. protecting. and
distributing
informntion.
deals with the information Information
resource
It
content.
manage-
mcnt is the process of architcctlng
[Gc] and managing the technological infrastructure
of the firm. It &ala with information conduit. which is II technic:11 issue.
Provided one accepts these definitions the rest of the book will be clear, but if one views information resources as the various categories of documents and one could be rather other media, puzzled by the attention given to managing computer resources. TDW
J. A. Beniger
The control rc~volution: Td~nologicd und economic origins of thr information society. London: Harvard University Press, 1986. x + 493 pp. ISBN 0 674 1698.5 9. f21.25. This is scholarship at its coruscating best - a brilliant and original exposition of the genesis of the information society. Beniger swoops across a huge intellectual terrain highlighting the ley lines of socio-technical development which by the tail-end of the nineteenth century have converged at a point he christens the Control Revolution. The central thesis of this mammoth work is summed up in the following introductory statement:
242
Until
the
Industrial
Revolution,
even the largest and most developed economies
ran
pace, with
literally
at human
processing
hanccd only slightly
speeds
en-
hy draft animals
and by wind and water power,
;Ind
with
cor-
system
control
respondingly
incrcascd
by modest hurcaucra-
tic structures.
By
far the greatest
effect of industrialization. perspective, society’s system. period
was
entire
to
from this speed
material
thereby precipitating in which
formation
innovations
processing
up
a
processing
and
a in incom-
munication behind plication
technologies lagged those of cncrgy and its apto
manufacturing
and
transportation. He identifies three primary dynamics which together account for the Control Revolution, beginning in the USA around the end of the nineteenth century: The coevolution of energy utilization, processing speed and control. The gains from control technology that accrued through increasing reliability and predictability The increasing control required of control technologies themselves. This crisis of control arose for the following reason: ‘So long as the energy used to process and move material throughputs did not much exceed that of human labor, individual workers in the system could provide the information processing required for its control’ (p. 427). Changes in the nature of the material economy (goods production, processing and distribution) during the eighteenth century created a need for improvements in man’s ability to process and communicate information. More sophisticated control mechanisms were required to sustain rapid increases in the throughput and distribution of goods to scattered markets. As the economy shifted from local segmented markets to increasingly higher levels of organization. the need for more effective information processing and communication capability grew apace. This, in Beniger’s view. contributed to the early maturation of the tertiary and quaternary sectors (e.g., banks, the postal service, public education,
insurance, chambers of commerce). Without the development of these sectors, the process of industrialization would not, he argues, have been possible-a dramatic reinterpretation of the historical sequence popularized by authors such as Daniel Bell. The Control Revolution which Beniger describes can be summarized as ‘a complex of rapid changes in the technological and economic arrangements by which information is processed, and communicated, and through which formal or programmed decisions might effect societal control’ (p. vi). And why is information so important? ‘The answer must be sought in the nature of all living systems ultimately in the relationship between information and control. Life itself implies control, after all, in individual cells and organisms no less than in any other purposive system’ (p. vi). This leads the author to look at purposiveness and control in-theround. His analysis begins with an ambitious foray into sociobiology and the nature of human life, socialization and systemic organization. He proceeds to identify four major control revolutions - four levels of control in the course of sophistication natural history, each of which (life, culture, bureaucracy, technology) has been characterized by an extension and refinement of the principle of Beniger’s information processing. scholarship carries us from a discussion of DNA molecules encoded with genetic programming, through semiotics and the role of ritual in society, before an extended analysis of control and distribution in pre-industrialized and industrialized economies. Throughout, Beniger sustains the elaborate thread of his thesis and en route provides imaginative insights into the nature of entropy. systems and the socioand information, economic significance of. inter aliu. auctions, jobbers, railroads, advertising, market research, radio. factory office machinery and automation, data processing technology. Despite the many exquisitely wrought subthemes and illustrations, the reader never loses sight of the whole and is led with confidence and elegance towards the central conclusion, namely,
Book reviews
that the information society has not resulted from recent changes, ‘but rather from increases in the speed of material processing and of flows through the material economy that began more than a century ago’ (p. 435). The information society is a fashion-
able construct which has spawned a literature of no mean proportion. The size of this corpus is. however, inversely related to its analytic quality and it is to be hoped that the responsible pamphleteers will pause sufficiently from their endeavours to ingest the fruits of Beniger’s labours. ‘The con-
trol revolution’
will certainly not be the last word on the emerging information society, but the sweeping synthesis it offers will not easily be matched. R. Crotlin
243