Technological Change

Introduction ix

Chapter 1. The Human and Social Sciences in the Face of Technological Change 1
1.1. Approaches to technological change 1
1.1.1. Technological determinism 2
1.1.2. Social constructivism 14
1.1.3. Joint structuring of technical and social aspects 19
1.1.4. Limitation of established distinctions 27
1.2. A brief history of technological change 27
1.2.1. How can we tell the story? 28
1.2.2. At the origins of the Industrial Revolution (from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance) 30
1.2.3. The First Industrial Revolution (end of the 18th Century) 32
1.2.4. The Second Industrial Revolution (late 19th Century to the 1910s) 34
1.2.5. The Computer Revolution (from the late 1960s to the 1990s) 36
1.2.6. The Digital Revolution (early 21st Century) 38

Chapter 2. Technological Change and Society 43
2.1. Powers, institutions and technological change 44
2.1.1. Fundamentals of political analysis and technology 44
2.1.2. The role of the State 45
2.1.3. Technological change in the age of globalization 50
2.1.4. The dark side of technology 52
2.2. Ethics in the face of technology 57
2.2.1. Ethical evaluation of technology 57
2.2.2. Three ethical issues under discussion 60
2.3. Technological change and diversity 66
2.3.1. Inclusive technology/exclusive technology 67
2.3.2. Technologies that reflect their designers 75
2.4. Technological change and ecology 78
2.4.1. Technology, an answer to ecological challenges? 78
2.4.2. Technology as a source of ecological degradation? 82

Chapter 3. Technological Change and Organization 87
3.1. Omnipresence of the technical object in work activities 87
3.1.1. The R&D function in the lead 88
3.1.2. Marketing challenged by digital transformation 89
3.1.3. Factory 4.0 90
3.1.4. e-HR 93
3.2. The interaction of technological and organizational systems 95
3.2.1. Technological change and organizational structure 95
3.2.2. Technological change, and financial and human resources for innovation 100
3.3. Technology as a liberator and control agent 104
3.3.1. Prescriptive and assistive technologies 104
3.3.2. Technological ambivalence: the same technology for empowerment and control purposes 111
3.4. Technological change as a social process 113
3.4.1. Changes in the social entity and management methods 114
3.4.2. Support for employees whose activities are threatened by technological change 121
3.4.3. The actors of technological change in organizations 127

Chapter 4. Technological Change and the Individual 135
4.1. Activity and technical object 136
4.1.1. The technical object in the activity system 136
4.1.2. The technical object and its mediations 138
4.2. The encounter between the individual and the technical object 142
4.2.1. The individual in the design phase 142
4.2.2. The individual in the adoption phase 144
4.2.3. The individual in the use phase 148
4.2.4. The individual between subject and object 151
4.3. Beyond the content of activities, a transformation of working structures 154
4.3.1. Variable effects depending on the technological equipment 154
4.3.2. The emergence of new work characteristics 155
4.3.3. The growth of telework 156
4.4. Technological changes and individual skills 158
4.4.1. Skills and their production 158
4.4.2. Digital skills as frames of reference 161
4.4.3. No digital skills outside the activity 163

Chapter 5. Experiencing Technological Change 165
5.1. Threats and opportunities associated with technological change in organizations 166
5.1.1. Overview of threats and opportunities associated with technological change 166
5.1.2. Threats and opportunities also concerning work organizations 168
5.2. Reconciling technical and social issues 171
5.2.1. Social or responsible innovations: definitions and examples 172
5.2.2. Responsible technological innovations within organizations 179
5.3. Managing responsible technological change 183
5.3.1. Organizational change management 183
5.3.2. The specificities of technological change 189
5.3.3. An integrative scheme for the management of responsible technological change 200

References 203
Index 219