Age of Surveillance Capitalism – The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power.

Abstract

As an educator have you recently heard the term or perhaps even been told to be data driven? Inherent in this simple two-word statement is a quagmire of ethical and privacy concerns that educators must confront to reach the goal and realize the expected results. Central to the concept of data-centered collection, interpretation, and prediction is surveillance capitalism from which many of the tools, methods, and ideology used originate. This review of Shoshana Zuboff's work narrows the focus to the implications for education both in the classroom and in research. As an educator, Zuboff describes three central areas of concern for education's adoption of surveillance capitalist methodologies: changes to the division of learning, private money in research, and the impacts on student development. The work presents many quesitons that can be raised at all levels of educaiton to quesiton technological adoption in and for the classroom.