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Book Cover
E-book
Author Medina, Eden, 1976- author.

Title Cybernetic revolutionaries : technology and politics in Allende's Chile / Eden Medina
Published Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, ©2011

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Description 1 online resource (xiv, 326 pages) : illustrations
Series ACLS Humanities E-Book
Contents Technological and political visions -- Cybernetics and socialism -- cybernetics in the battle for production -- Designing a network -- Constructing the liberty machine -- The October strike -- Cybersyn goes public -- Conclusion : technology, politics, history
Summary A historical study of Chile's twin experiments with cybernetics and socialism, and what they tell us about the relationship of technology and politics. In Cybernetic Revolutionaries, Eden Medina tells the history of two intersecting utopian visions, one political and one technological. The first was Chile's experiment with peaceful socialist change under Salvador Allende; the second was the simultaneous attempt to build a computer system that would manage Chile's economy. Neither vision was fully realized--Allende's government ended with a violent military coup; the system, known as Project Cybersyn, was never completely implemented--but they hold lessons for today about the relationship between technology and politics. Drawing on extensive archival material and interviews, Medina examines the cybernetic system envisioned by the Chilean government--which was to feature holistic system design, decentralized management, human-computer interaction, a national telex network, near real-time control of the growing industrial sector, and modeling the behavior of dynamic systems. She also describes, and documents with photographs, the network's Star Trek-like operations room, which featured swivel chairs with armrest control panels, a wall of screens displaying data, and flashing red lights to indicate economic emergencies. Studying project Cybersyn today helps us understand not only the technological ambitions of a government in the midst of political change but also the limitations of the Chilean revolution. This history further shows how human attempts to combine the political and the technological with the goal of creating a more just society can open new technological, intellectual, and political possibilities. Technologies, Medina writes, are historical texts; when we read them we are reading history
Analysis SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY & SOCIETY/General
SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY & SOCIETY/History of Technology
COMPUTER SCIENCE/Human Computer Interaction
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references and index
Notes English
Subject Government business enterprises -- Computer networks -- Chile
Government ownership -- Chile
Cybernetics -- Political aspects -- Chile
COMPUTERS -- Information Technology.
COMPUTERS -- History.
Economic history
Government ownership
Politics and government
Datentechnik
Politik
Cybernetik -- politiska aspekter.
Datakommunikation -- politiska aspekter.
Politik och massmedia.
Kommunikation i politiken.
SUBJECT Chile -- Politics and government -- 1970-1973 -- Case studies
Chile -- Economic conditions -- 1970-1973 -- Case studies
Subject Chile
Chile
Genre/Form Case studies
Case studies.
Études de cas.
Form Electronic book
ISBN 0262298295
9780262298292
9780262297387
0262297388
0262525968
9780262525961