{"resolved":true,"match_type":"uuid","source_type":"original_book","book_id":"bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908","title":"Pressed for Time The Acceleration of Life in Digital Capitalism","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9780226196473","requested_by":"printed_page","book":{"source_type":"original_book","book_id":"bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908","id":"bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908","uuid":"bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908","title":"Pressed for Time The Acceleration of Life in Digital Capitalism","normalized_title":"pressedfortimetheaccelerationoflifeindigitalcapitalism","author":null,"edition":null,"publisher":null,"year":null,"isbn":"9780226196473","isbns":["9780226196473","9780226196503"],"parsed":true,"ai_readable":true,"document_type":"book","page_count":228,"navigation_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908","title_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/title/Pressed%20for%20Time%20The%20Acceleration%20of%20Life%20in%20Digital%20Capitalism","fixed_page_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/ai/book/bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908/page/{printed_page}","path_api_url_template":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/book/bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908/page/{printed_page}","read_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/read/bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908","page_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908/page","search_url":"https://workshop.closeclaw.top/api/ai/books/bff2be14-96b0-46f1-8e61-474593cba908/search"},"page":{"printed_page":16,"pdf_page":28,"physical_index":28,"physical_index_base":0,"printed_page_status":"recognized","page_sha256":"5a8ab4e0e3f285e416ecd3e86135d1260cb736100fa352f2fd5f9d94ef0976f8"},"chapter":"Pressed for Time","content":"Now the most intriguing question is how these three types of acceleration relate to each other. As Rosa points out, there is clearly a paradox between the first and third process. If technological acceleration means that less time is needed (for production, transport, etc.), this should entail an increase in free time, which in turn would slow down the pace of life. Rather than time becoming abundant, however, time seems to be increasingly scarce. Accordingly, it only makes sense to apply the term acceleration society to a society if “technological acceleration and the growing scarcity of time (that is, an acceleration of the ‘pace of life’) occur simultaneously.”4 Interrogating this “time pressure” paradox is the central quest of my book.\n\nAccording to this definition, most general analyses of contemporary society can be read as versions of the acceleration society thesis. In other words, they make a direct, causal link between technological acceleration, especially the speed of electronic communication systems, and the harriedness of everyday life. The fact that our social interactions in both work and leisure time are increasingly mediated by technology—that we live in a state of constant connectivity—is a recurring theme. Here I want to focus primarily on how the connection between the speed of technology and the pace of life is formulated.\n\nThere is a vast literature on what is commonly referred to as time-space compression. Geographer David Harvey classically conceived of this process as being at the heart of modernity, or, in some formulations, postmodernity: “I use the term ‘compression’ because . . . the history of capitalism has been characterized by speed-up in the pace of life, while . . . space appears to shrink to a ‘global village.’”5\n\nKey to Harvey’s work on the spatial-temporal dynamics of capitalism is the notion that economic processes are accelerating. For him, the driving forces behind social acceleration are globalization and innovations in ICT that facilitate the fast turnover of capital across the globe. In contrast to industrial capitalism, which requires the exploitation of labor through strict adherence to clock time and Fordist spatial models like the assembly line, flexible accumulation requires a shift in the ways we think about time. Harvey observes that the general speed-up in the turnover time of capital accentuates the volatility and ephemerality of commodities and capital. Fast capitalism annihilates space and time. The distances that once hampered global trade are made meaningless as humans increasingly communicate using “real-time” technologies. Time becomes beyond control as distance disappears in a world of instantaneous and simultaneous events. Acceleration, then, is reflected in the substantive temporalities of human existence, in particular, the growing sense of time-space compression in everyday life.\n\nChapter One\n\n16","previous_page":15,"next_page":17}