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On 22. Dec 2024, at 04:20, Luis Suarez-Villa via Eurograd
 wrote:

> Technology and Oligopoly Capitalism, by Luis Suarez-Villa (publisher:
Routledge).
>
https://www.routledge.com/Technology-and-Oligopoly-Capitalism/Suarez-Villa/p/
book/9781032386157
> [To request inspection copy:
> https://www.routledge.com/textbooks/evaluation/9781003345893?utm_id= ]
>
> Description:
> Technology and Oligopoly Capitalism is a major contribution to our
> understanding of how technology oligopolies are shaping America’s
> social, economic, and political reality.
>
> Technology oligopolies are the most powerful socioeconomic entities in
> America. From cradle to grave, the decisions they make affect the most
> intimate aspects of our lives, how we work, what we eat, our health, how
> we communicate, what we know and believe, whom we elect, and how we
> relate to one another and to nature. Their power over markets, trade,
> regulation, and most every aspect of our governance is more intrusive
> and farther-reaching than ever. They benefit from tax breaks, government
> guarantees, and bailouts that we must pay for and have no control over.
> Their accumulation of capital creates immense wealth for a minuscule
> elite, deepening disparities while politics and governance become ever
> more subservient to their power. They determine our skills and transform
> employment through the tools and services they create, as no other
> organizations can. They produce a vast array of goods and services with
> labor, marketing, and research that are more intrusively controlled than
> ever, as workplace rights and job security are curtailed or disappear.
> Our consumption of their products---and their capacity to promote
> wants---is deep and far reaching, while the waste they generate raises
> concerns about the survival of life on our planet. And their links to
> geopolitics and the martial domain are stronger than ever, as they
> influence how warfare is waged and who will be vanquished.
>
> Technology and Oligopoly Capitalism’s critical, multidisciplinary
> perspective provides a systemic vision of how oligopolistic power shapes
> these forces and phenomena. An inclusive approach spans the spectrum of
> technology oligopolies and the ways in which they deploy their power.
> Numerous, previously unpublished ideas expand the repertory of
> established work on the topics covered, advancing explanatory
> quality---to elucidate how and why technology oligopolies operate as
> they do, the dysfunctions that accompany their power, and their effects
> on society and nature. This book has no peers in the literature, in its
> scope, the unprecedented amount and diversity of documentation, the
> breadth of concepts, and the vast number of examples it provides. Its
> premises deserve to be taken into account by every student, researcher,
> policymaker, bibliographer, and author interested in the socioeconomic
> and political dimensions of technology in America.
>
> Contents:
> 1. Introduction
>
> 2. Power
>     Pricing
>        Co-Respectiveness
>        Shareholder Returns
>        Mergers and Acquisitions
>        Entry Barrier Engineering
>        Neo-Conglomerates
>        Standards Setting
>        Deregulation
>     Innovation
>        Development vs. Research
>        Technological Barriers
>        Intangibles
>     International Projection
>        Trade and the Dollar
>        Cross-Shareholding
>     Public Governance
>        Anti-Regulatory Praxis
>        Lobbying and Patronage
>        Money in Politics
>        Revolving Doors
>        Judiciary System
>
> 3. Accumulation
>     Value
>        Commodity Value
>     Product Markets
>        Competition
>        Capital and Labor
>        Accumulation and Pricing
>        Oligopolistic Accumulation
>        Consolidation
>        Speculative Finance
>        New Technologies
>     Input Markets
>        Imposing Terms
>        Dual Oligopoly: Inputs, Products
>     Labor Markets
>        Insecurity
>        Contingency Labor
>        Uselabor
>        Dual Oligopoly: Labor, Products
>     Compound Oligopoly
>        Complexity and Lock-In
>
> 4. Transformation
>     Elements
>        Labor
>        Capital
>        Production
>        Research and Product Development
>     Commodification
>        Commodity Fetishism
>        Technological Fetishism
>        Data Commodification
>        Standardizing and Systematizing
>     Reproduction
>        Capital Resources
>        Capacity for Work
>        Labor Intangibles
>     Capacity Utilization
>        Excess Capacity
>        Capacity-Price Engineering
>     Typologies
>        Extraction and Assemblage
>        Integrative Production
>        Inventive Appropriation
>
> 5. Dysfunction
>     Employment
>        Technocapitalist Control
>        Compensation and Productivity
>        Long-Term Deficit
>     Consumer Exploitation
>        Pricing Differential
>        Add-Ons
>     Data Exploitation
>        Clouds
>        Networks
>     Wants Contrivance
>        Overconsumption
>        Addictions
>        Typologies
>     Waste
>        Toxicity and Pollution
>        E-Waste
>        Agro-Tech
>        Microbiome Disruption
>        Eco-Planetary
>        Techno-Fixes
>        Efficiency Mirage
>     The Commons
>        Lauderdale Paradox
>        Access and Benefit
>        Appropriation
>
> 6. Domination
>     Commodity Chains
>     Arbitrage
>        Labor Arbitrage
>        Value Arbitrage
>     Control Hierarchies
>        Biotechnology
>        Intellectual Property
>        Cybernetics
>        Financial
>        Socio-Political
>     Enforcement
>        Enforcement Platform
>        Multimodality
>     Taxpaying
>        Contractual Money
>        Taxpayer Exploitation
>
> 7. Techno-Oligarchy
>
> Chapter abstracts:
> 2. Power.
> Considers the sources of power of technology oligopoly capitalism.  A
> broad scope on how power is amassed and imposed is unique in treatments
> of technology.  Control over market pricing is critically addressed, to
> show the importance of co-respectiveness, purported optimization of
> returns, mergers, acquisitions, entry barrier engineering, standards
> setting, and deregulation for oligopolistic power.  Conceptualization of
> technology neo-conglomerates provides insights on how oligopolies expand
> their power as they deepen control over market pricing.  Innovation is
> examined---to consider how invention and research have been turned into
> marketing accessories.  The vital relevance of intangible resources,
> their social reproduction, and the obstacles posed by technology
> oligopolies are examined.  International trade, monetary issues, and
> risky financial cross-shareholding are discussed critically.  The
> influence of technology oligopolies on public governance considers
> strategies, how they promote anti-regulatory efforts, the spread of
> lobbying, patronage, and political contributions.  The judiciary
> system’s role is addressed by considering landmark decisions and
> precedent as major sources of power.  Treatment of strategies and
> actions---including those unique to technology oligopolies---and a vast
> amount of documentation make this chapter essential for researchers,
> students, policy-makers, and bibliographers.  The contents of this
> chapter have no peer in the literature on technology, and are vitally
> important for specialists considering antitrust action.
>
> 3. Accumulation.
> Analyzes the accumulative dynamic of technology oligopoly capitalism,
> its elements and market scenarios.  Unique in its conceptualization of
> how the accumulative dynamic operates, and the importance of surpluses
> in the productive cycle.  The relationship of oligopolistic capital
> accumulation to classical works provides much needed historical
> perspective on the importance of labor and capital in accumulation. 
> Consideration of strategies that expand accumulation by capturing market
> segments---and the role of acquisitions, entry barriers, finance, data
> appropriation, clouds and platforms---document their importance for
> oligopolistic control over the productive cycle.  Conceptualization and
> discussion of dual and compound oligopoly---and their relationship with
> aspects uniquely found in technology oligopolies---have no peers in the
> literature.  Definition and elaboration of the concept of uselabor
> provides insights on a phenomenon unique to social media and search
> oligopolies.  Emergence of uselabor and its relationship with the
> commercialization of the web, data appropriation, and capital
> accumulation is considered in detail.  A vast amount of documentation
> makes this chapter a vital reference work for technology studies.  The
> contents of this chapter should be considered essential reading and
> reference for researchers, students, policy-makers, bibliographers, and
> those interested in knowing how technology oligopolies became as
> important as they are.
>
> 4. Transformation.
> Examines the deep structure of how commodities are transformed through
> production, research and product development.  Unique in its breadth,
> details, and documentation.  Distinctive systemic elements and phenomena
> of productive transformation are considered critically.  The
> relationship of transformation to classical works and their views on
> labor provides historical perspective, relating it to critical aspects
> of value and creativity.  In-depth treatment of the phenomena of
> commodification and reproduction is unprecedented in the literature,
> providing unique insights on the technology domain.  Definition and
> elaboration of the concepts of technological fetishism and of
> capacity-price engineering explain distinctive operational features of
> oligopolistic control.  Use of the concept of systematized research
> regimes to explain how research and product development operate provides
> necessary perspectives on the value of labor intangibles.  Further
> development of the concept of uselabor explains how production operates
> in social media oligopolies, and its implications for fairness and
> justice.  A typological analysis then provides a synthesis of how the
> multiple facets of transformation operate in concert.  The vast amount
> of documentation makes this chapter a major reference work.  This
> chapter has no peers in the literature, and should be of vital interest
> to bibliographers, researchers, policy analysts, students, and authors
> interested in how technology oligopolies produce, create and exploit.
>
> 5. Dysfunction.
> Analyzes major systemic dysfunctions of technology oligopolies and their
> effects on economic wellbeing, health and nature.  Influence of new
> technologies on employment and their dysfunctional effects regarding
> productivity, the long-term job deficit, and workplace control. 
> Conceptualization of consumer exploitation has no peers in the
> technology literature.  Role of the pricing differential as a
> dysfunctional feature of consumption is documented with numerous
> examples.  Unique in its conceptualization of data exploitation in
> technology oligopolies, the role of networks and data clouds. 
> Conceptualization of wants contrivance, its effects and typologies,
> provides much needed perspective.  Analyses of the micro- and
> macro-panorama of waste and their effects on the environment, health and
> nature have no peer in the literature.  Examination of proposed
> techno-fixes to eco-planetary dysfunction emphasizes the urgency of
> addressing carbon emissions, climate change and the destruction of life.
>   Consideration of the commons addresses dysfunctional aspects of access,
> benefit and expropriation---addressing the contradiction between private
> wealth and collective benefit.  Extensive documentation makes this
> chapter a major reference work for bibliographers, students,
> researchers, policy analysts, and authors interested in technology.  The
> contents of this chapter have no peer in the technology literature, and
> should be considered required reading for courses on technology and
> society, policy analysis, and social economics.
>
> 6. Domination.
> Provides macro-systemic perspectives on the vital importance of global
> domination for technology oligopoly capitalism.  Unique in how it
> relates technology oligopoly capitalism to the martial domain, and to
> global domination over new technologies.  The symbiotic relationship
> between technology oligopolies and the martial domain is explored
> through several binding elements---geopolitics, commodity chains, labor
> and value arbitrage, and the setting of hierarchic global controls over
> the most advanced technologies.  Technology-enabled, “soft” approaches
> to domination---and the role of technology oligopolies---are explored
> and documented.  Ways of enforcing domination are analyzed, considering
> the role of technology oligopolies, their symbiosis with the military
> apparatus, and their global impacts.  Multimodality in warfare---and its
> relationship with technology oligopolies---is explored and documented. 
> The concept of taxpayer exploitation---and its relationship with the
> creation and use of new technologies by the martial domain---is
> presented and extensively documented.  Numerous contemporary examples
> are provided throughout, along with a vast bibliography that reaches
> across the technology spectrum.  The contents of this chapter have no
> peers in the literature, in their scope and multidisciplinary
> perspectives.  The vast amount of documentation provided makes it
> essential reading for any researcher, student, author or bibliographer
> wishing to explore how technology oligopolies condition our contemporary
> global reality.
>
> 7. Techno-Oligarchy.
> The existential impasse of technology oligopoly capitalism, and the
> relations of power imposed by a minuscule, but very wealthy and powerful
> elite, are core concerns of this chapter.  Unique in its
> conceptualization of a totalistic supra-structure that operates as an
> alter state---to perpetuate the power of a minuscule elite.  Its
> systemic inducement of social alienation---a pervasive feature of
> contemporary life---is examined.  Alienation from nature, from invention
> and innovation, from governance, the martial domain, and from socially
> responsible taxation are considered---to link up with contents of
> previous chapters.  This approach broadens the concept of social
> alienation, by relating it to macro-scale aspects of technology
> oligopoly capitalism that are unique in the technology literature.  Ways
> to move forward are addressed, to help chart a trajectory that can
> provide constructive alternatives.  The concept of totalistic control
> structure may motivate researchers and students to look into the macro
> dimensions of social systems, and the impacts of technology.  Important
> for conceptualizations of social structure, and the evolution of the
> relations of power in society.  The contents of this chapter should be
> considered essential reading for researchers, authors and students who
> wish to understand the power of oligarchic elites over technology, and
> the imposition of totalistic supra-structures.
>
> Notes.
> Provide the most extensive documentation of any work in the technology
> literature (existing or past).  Unique as a reference resource for
> bibliographers, librarians, students, researchers and policy-makers. 
> References can become the core of a digital library on technology---due
> to their breadth, their extent, and the level of detail.  Such a library
> would be a major reference resource for the twenty-first century.
> ________
>
> Luis Suarez-Villa is Professor Emeritus of Social Ecology and of
> Planning, Policy, and Design at the University of California (Irvine).
> Among his previous books are Corporate Power, Oligopolies, and the
> Crisis of the State; Globalization and Technocapitalism; and
> Technocapitalism: A Critical Perspective on Technological Innovation and
> Corporatism.
> Luis Suarez-Villa – UCI School of Social Ecology
> ________
>
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