656 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE the structure of the book is laid out, contains not a single endnote. We find the Frankfurt school mentioned on page 4, but no discus sion (or citation) of how to use that theory follows. The theoretical basis of Hollywood in the Information Age is defined by what Wasko does not accept; in only four single sentences does she lay out her approach. This is a work of Marxist political economy. We read lament after lament about the skill that Hollywood owners and managers have used to get and maintain corporate power. Some may admire how Hollywood has taken over each new mass entertainment technology. Wasko does not. But she seems frustrated at explaining why. For example, it is only after twenty-eight pages on the major and minor Hollywood corporate operations that we learn, in a mere 200 words, why Wasko thinks “the Big Boys are Big”: they are diversified. Moreover, in an analysis of contemporary Hollywood the reader expects, rightly, a book that is up-to-date. But that is difficult in a world where events are changing so rapidly, and university presses take their time. The cutoff here is early 1993, before Viacom had taken over Paramount and Matsushita sold, at a deep discount, MCA/Universal. Wasko’s conclusion that “MCA was certainly a plum for Matsushita” (p. 63) seems quaint in light of the subsequent near giveaway of MCA by the giantJapanese electrical manufacturer. Matsushita lost billions of dollars in its five-year foray into Holly wood. In a world where vast new alliances between Hollywood and the “Baby Bells” headline the business press on a daily basis, it is difficult to tread that fine line between current analysis and a review ofchanges that took place during the 1980s. Hollywood in the Informa tion Age is in fact the latter. Douglas Gomery Dr Gomeryis professor in the College ofjournalism at the University ofMaryland. His column “The Economics of Television” appears in AmericanJournalism Review. Science, Technology, and the Environment: Multidisciplinary Perspectives. Edited by James Rodger Fleming and Henry A. Gemery. Akron, Ohio: University of Akron Press, 1994. Pp. xxxiv+344; illustra tions, tables, notes, index. $39.95 (cloth); $21.95 (paper). This collection of thirteen papers, all originally produced for a Colby College Science and Technology Studies symposium series, reminds us that our society, like the world at large, faces enormous, and enormously difficult, environmental problems: global warming, a precipitous decline in biodiversity, and overpopulation, to name a few. The problems are depressing and, to those hopeful of easy solutions, so is one of the themes of the book: there is no “techno logical fix” that will solve them. But the fifteen authors—mainly sci TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 657 entists drawn from fields such as biology, physics, meteorology, geol ogy, and ecology, plus a few policy-oriented social scientists, and one humanist—are not pessimists, nor are the editors. A second theme of the book is that environmental problems may indeed be solved or at least amelioratedby experts engaged in interdisciplinary collab oration. This book, along with the rest of the University of Akron series on technology and environment ofwhich it is a part, gestures toward general, nonacademic audiences. The majority of essays, however, are too technical or too narrowly focused to interest any but aspiring or practicing environmental engineers and scientists. One article, on regulating the electromagnetic environment, is completely out of place. The contributions by meteorologistJohn Dutton, physicist Norman Ramsey, cultural historian Leo Marx, African-American studies scholar Robert Bullard, and Elena Nikitina of the Russian Academy of Sciences are broader in scope and more accessible to nonspecialists. Dutton’s paper provides a good introduction to the phenomenon of global warming, although some readers may be discouraged by his use of equations. Bullard’s article on environmental racism de parts from the volume’s emphasis on expert solutions, reminding us that equitable solutions to certain problems, such as the siting of hazardous-waste facilities, may require organized community action. Nikitina describes environmental tragedies in the former Soviet Union, an important topic about which those interested in ecologi cal problems need to know more. Her essay, while harshly...
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