The New Politics of Technology in the British Civil Service

Abstract

This article examines why and how management of a department of the British civil service (`the Agency') has sought to use new information and communication technologies (ICTs) to change the organization of a complex form of administrative casework. In contrast to optimistic Information Age arguments that new workplace technologies will tend to benefit workers as well as employers, it is shown that Agency management have sought to use the new ICTs to increase their control over staff. This has involved the reorganization of some telephone work into a call centre for the first time. It is shown that the aim of increasing control has been not only to intensify work, but also to establish a technical basis for a broader restructuring of terms and conditions of employment that it was hoped would involve a reduction in the costs and place-bound nature of Agency labour. The article identifies a number of political and technical factors that have constrained managers from realizing the control they originally sought, so compelling them to preserve a complex form of call working and related employment conditions that they had originally intended to radically change. The article concludes with a discussion of how the new technical systems within the Agency have altered power relations between managers and staff, how government is hoping to use such technologies to cut costs across all civil service departments, and where resistance to such change may come from.