Zeros and Ones: Digital Women and the New Technoculture - Hardcover

Plant, Sadie

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1857023862 ISBN 13: 9781857023862

Publisher: Fourth Estate, 1997

Synopsis

Business schools are arguably some of the most influential institutions in contemporary society. The research and education they provide set the standard for how future leaders manage local and global organizations - a responsibility requiring continual discussion, development and challenge.

This exciting book explores the role of business schools through 3 key dimensions:

- How business school legitimacy has been challenged by the recent economic crisis and corporate scandals;

- How schools contribute to shaping and transforming business conduct; and

- How institutions, past and present, develop their identities to face the challenges presented by the ongoing globalization process.

Combining global perspectives from business school Deans, scholars and stakeholders, this book presents a unique discussion of the current and future challenges facing business schools and their contributions to society.

About this title

Review:

Meet Ada Lovelace, daughter of mathematician Annabella Byron and poet Lord Byron, and a major contributor to Charles Babbage's famous Analytic Engine. Lovelace is in many ways the patron saint of Sadie Plant's exploration of women's roles in the creation of modern technology. The book begins with Lovelace's story, and elements of her writings appear throughout the book--sometimes to emphasize points but often to exemplify attitude. They also serve to anchor Plant's dynamic, almost stream-of-consciousness approach as we travel to 19th-century Europe to meet the nameless women who laid the foundation of modern technology with the development of weaving, survey the major female technological innovators of today, and even explore female figures in technology-based fiction.

Plant's "cyberfeminist rant", as William Gibson calls it, attempts to demonstrate that women have always used technology. You won't find victims here, rather women who were empowered by the technological innovations in their lives. What emerges is a very nontraditional feminist picture, one in which women are neither bystanders nor victims but are in many ways the unsung heroes of technical innovation. The author also points to a future where, within the zeros and ones of cyberspace, many dichotomies such as life/machine, let alone male/female, may blur in unexpected ways.

Review:

Business schools are among the most influential institutions in contemporary society. This book represents a most welcome voice in the urgent need to discuss the future role of business schools. What skills and competences do we need of our leaders of tomorrow? How do we make sure that business schools are able to not only educate students in traditional business skills, but also give them such a basic understanding of the dynamics of contemporary society so they may interact constructively with the diversity of stakeholders and thus contribute to the role business must play in securing the sustainabiliy of our global society? How may business schools contribute in innovative ways to the development of a society that is in need of new ways of addressing basic needs such as equal rights, clean water, energy and waste disposal? While this book does not pretend to provide all the answers to such demanding questions, it will stimulate reflection by questioning conventional business school thinking
Mads Øvlisen
Special Advisor to UN Global Compact and former Chair of Novo Nordisk

After the 2008 crisis, the private sector has been more than ever under the public limelight. In the midst of this debate, one central issue seems to be how business schools develop and foster management models that shape how businesses behave. This book finally opens the possibility to reflect on the multiple forms in which business schools are contributing to society
Philippe Louvet
Corporate Director, Learning for Development, L'Oreal

About this edition

• Publisher: Fourth Estate
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 1857023862
• ISBN 13: 9781857023862
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 320