Selling Us the Fortress Book

In the wake of the school shootings of the 1990s and more recent threats of terrorism, schools--like other public places and institutions--have begun to install metal detectors, surveillance cameras networked to the internet, palm and iris scanners, facial recognition technology, ID card with microchip tracking systems, profiling software, and other techno-security devices. Selling us the Fortress explores not just the results and implications of these devices, but also how we have gotten to this juncture in history. Using a political economy perspective, the book explains how technologies once reserved primary for war have become a common fixture of even schools. The book takes readers back to the founding of national research laboratories in the United States and the development of spy technologies for national security purpose during the Cold War. It examines federal support for technology development, gives information about businesses that deal security equipment, analyzes the ways security equipment, analyzes the ways security equipment is sold, and how policies and laws have supported the public use of techno-security.Read More