Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
The recent data controversy with Facebook highlights that the tech industry as a whole was utterly unprepared for the backlash it faced as a result of its business model of selling user data to third parties. Despite the predominant role that technology plays in all of our lives, the controversy also revealed that many tech companies are reactive, rather than proactive, in addressing crises.
This book examines society's failure to manage technology and its resulting negative consequences. Mitroff argues that the "technological mindset" is responsible for society's unbridled obsession with technology and unless confronted, will cause one tech crisis after another. This trans-disciplinary text, edgy in its approach, will appeal to academics, students, and practitioners through its discussion of the modern technological crisis.
Synopsis
Chapter One: The Revolution of Everything
By way of several examples, Chapter One presents the nature of the transformation/revolution due to the unprecedented advance of technology we are undergoing. The examples range from those that are transforming the inherent nature and structure of reality to those that are transforming our minds and bodies. Each illustrates a particular type of crisis caused by technology.
Chapter Two: It's All About Systems
Chapter Two revisits the examples in Chapter One from the standpoint of systems. It first examines what is and what isn't a system. It then shows that every aspect of our being is part and parcel of complex, messy systems. The failure to think systemically is responsible for our inability to cope with the most complex, messy system of all-reality itself. Worst of all, it leads to crises that challenge our abilities to cope effectively.
Chapter Three: Wicked Messes
The Pioneering Work of Horst Rittel and Russ Ackoff
Chapter Three extends the concept of complex, messy systems even further. It shows that the systems of which we are increasingly a part are more complex than anything we've ever encountered. At every level of our existence and being, we are not only dealing with, but we are part of wicked messes.
The supreme challenge is how one manages, better yet, copes with wicked messes. This is especially critical since crises are some of the prime components of wicked messes. There are no such things as self-standing, individual crises that are totally distinct and separate from one another. Although Chapter Ten treats crisis management in detail, every chapter introduces key components of it. Taken together, they lead to a substantial revision of our previous ideas and knowledge of crisis management.
Step-by-step, the book builds up the intellectual concepts and the emotional fortitude that are necessary in first recognizing and then treating the daunting crises that are integral parts of wicked messes.
Chapter Four: The Psychodynamics of Messes
The Pioneering Work of Melanie Klein and Donald Winicott
Chapter Four discusses the work of the enormously influential child psychoanalyst Melanie Klein. It shows the psychological difficulties in merely acknowledging the existence of complex, messy systems, let alone in dealing with them. To put it mildly, this makes the recognition of the crises that are associated with complex, messy systems even more difficult.
The chapter shows how our minds are organized in such a way that we characteristically split the world into "good" versus "bad guys and/or forces." For instance, recently Mark Zuckerberg has claimed, "Old people can't do tech." Similar claims have been made that "tech is a man's game," Needless to say, this makes the treatment of complex, messy systems-not to mention crises--even messier and more complex.
There is a deeper implication still of Klein's work. For instance, Facebook has rightly been accused of undermining trust i