Electronic Sweatshop: How Computers Are Transforming the Office of the Future into the Factory of the Past

by Barbara Garson

Tells how corporations are using automation and expert systems to transform secretaries, executives, and professionals into clerks, and describes examples in businesses and government

Genres: Nonfiction, Labor, Computers, History

Hardcover

First published October 1, 1989

About the author

Barbara Garson is an American playwright, author and social activist, perhaps best known for the play MacBird. Garson attended the University of California, Berkeley, where she earned a B.A. specializing in Classical History in 1964. She was active in the Free Speech Movement, as the editor of The Free Speech Movement Newsletter, which was printed on an offset press that she herself had restored. She was one of 800 arrested on December 2, 1964 at a sit-in at Sproul Hall, Berkeley, following the "Machine Speech" by Mario Savio. In 1968, Garson had a child, Juliet, and in 1969 she went to work at The Shelter Half, an anti-war GI coffee house near Fort Lewis Army base in Tacoma, Washington. In the early 1970s, she moved to Manhattan, publishing short, humorous essays and theater reviews primarily for The Village Voice as well as plays.

Reviews

[Ben Heller · Rating 5 out of 5]

I spent five years as an engineer frustrated every time a co-worker did something incorrectly, or a factory worker did their job poorly, and started to say to myself "what I wouldn't give to have a bunch of robots doing their work". After reading this book, I understand that I am part of the problem. It is our humanity that makes life worth living. This book may have been written in 1989, but it prophecies the world we live in now to a chilling degree. That being said, technology does not need to be used to dehumanize, and there are clear areas where a synergy between humans and machines is better for both parties. I eagerly look forward to finding that space.

[Peter McKenzie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent read. Garson, through a wide range of interviews, makes numerous observations and predictions regarding the future of workplace control and automation. Well ahead of its time & still relevant today.

[Elzbeth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reading this was so weird because you're reading from 2016 or whatever, looking at a book set in the '80s where computers are just being introduced into the workplace. To any of us, this is common sense. We know things get done faster, cheaper and more efficiently, but at the time, so many people were resisting change. It makes me wonder, what are we resisting now that will soon be the future?

[George Mount · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great book, far ahead of its time. I especially like when the author mentions the rise of a freelance/gig economy, keep in mind this book was written decades ago -- so many of the hot topics in today's digital economy are not new. Some of the case studies/individual interviews are kind of slow and boring. But I absolutely love when the author bridges some conclusions from her field work.