[Book Review] The Globotics Upheaval: Globalization, Robotics and the Future of Work
Richard Baldwin (the Graduate Institute / Twitter)
The Globotics Upheaval: Globalization, Robotics and the Future of Work
London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2019, 20 pounds hbk, (ISBN: 9871474609012), 292 pp.
Although Baldwin recognizes that job displacement driven by Globotics, which is defined as a combination of globalization (such as telemigrants) and robotics (such as robotic process automation), is not new (such as eliminated jobs in farms or factories in the past), he argues that this time is different because of the growing amount of data and processing capabilities of computers. That is, innovations in digital technology, such as remote intelligence and artificial intelligence, are technically possible to replace many white-collar, service-sector, and professional jobs which are done by humans locally now. Because a large number of people in the developed countries are employing in this sector now, Baldwin worries that many of them could soon face similar difficulties of manufacturing workers whose jobs have been offshored or automatized. Without adequate public policies to protect workers, Baldwin concerns that upheaval or backlash such as the populism (especially right-wing politicians or political parties) could be more common. Although Baldwin maintains an optimistic view since the technology shortly could not replace human in tasks involving social and emotional intelligence, creativity, and innovativeness, he still argues that the government should find resolutions to be well-prepared.
Critically speaking, the arguments mentioned above are not surprising to readers who have concerned the future of work for a while. However, Baldwin makes efforts to put the technological and economic transformation into the political, societal, and historical contexts such as his transformation-upheaval-backlash-resolution framework. For example, Baldwin attributes the increasing rates of social isolation, obesity, divorce, suicide, and the elections of Donald Trump and Brexit happened/are happening to the outrage and hopeless voters who lost jobs because of the increasing offshoring and automation during the Service Transformation. Baldwin further worries that once the class consciousness formed among the displaced white-collar, service-sector, and professional workers in the Globotics Transformation, there would be another trend of upheaval or backlash if the government failed to tackle the problem.
Public policies, without doubt, should be responsive to the people left behind the technological or economic transformation, but we should not attribute the elections of right-wing populism and some of the social problems solely to the technological or economic forces. For example, Baldwin refers to Haidt’s research arguing that voters chose Trump since his authoritarian characteristics (p.218). Besides, Stenner’s work, also cited by Baldwin (p.76), shows that ‘economic conservatives’, ‘status quo lovers’, and ‘authoritarians’ are the three main types of voters supporting Trump. These are the factors, other than the economic or technological forces, we should consider as understanding the current politics. Besides, the factors leading to the increasing rates of social isolation, obesity, divorce, suicide, etc. might be more than economic or technological forces. Although Baldwin tries to explain these social problems in terms of anomie or liquidity, more in-depth studies instead of only broad concepts are expected.
Baldwin also does not adequately address the issue that the ability of any specific technology to replace human in jobs does not directly lead to the adoption and further the implementation of one technology in real settings such as workplaces. Baldwin refers to one report conducted by McKinsey Global Institute to argue that white-collar robots are better at some skills (such as optimization, searching and retrieving information, recognizing known patterns, and gross motor skills) than humans. Although companies have been investing heavily in related technologies due to competitive pressures, we should further examine: to what extent do companies adopt and implement these technologies? Baldwin brings us some examples such as white-collar robotics in big corporations, but we should conduct both macro- and micro-level studies to understand how these technologies work and impact on our workplaces and employment. For example: what are the adoption and implementation rates of robotic process automation? What are the new employer-employee relationships due to the more reliance on white-collar robotics?
The Globotics Upheaval is a good read because it comprehensively draws insights from research works in sociology, psychology, economics, politics, history, and business management. However, some critical issues that Baldwin does not address deserve further studies. For example, what is the role of the two oil crises during the 1970s and neoliberalism advocated by scholars and politicians in the 1980s and 1990s during the Service Transformation? Do the trend of populism and the social protection offered by the government have necessarily to do with the Service Transformation in high-income countries other than the US and UK, such as Japan? Do the occupations in education could be sheltered from the Globotics Transformation though there are massive open online courses? Baldwin might not intend to cover all of these issues in his latest work, but readers interested in the future of work could be invoked to do more research.
