An accessible book for anyone who is concerned about the future of their job or their profession. The underlying message of the book is optimistic. It is about opportunities that will emerge from wider markets and new technologies, and its conclusion should help people prepare themselves better for the future. Although the book is informed by management theory, economic and social psychology, it is not heavy or theoretical. It includes case studies and examples drawn from England, Continental Europe, the USA and Asia to examine companies which exemplify the trends described here.
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A nation of shopkeepers? Well ... maybe. That's the way things are in the knowledge economy. Individually and collectively we are all trading on ideas, creativity and judgement to make a living. Put it another way, this is the thin air business and these are the thin air commodities. The difference is that we're now promoting a new type of brand: ourselves. "Knowledge," states Charles Leadbeater in Living on Thin Air "is our most precious resource: we should organise society to maximise its creation and use. Our aim should be to harness the power of markets and community to the more fundamental goal of creating and spreading knowledge." Big ideas, but for the truly knowledge-driven society, the prize, he says, is "radical and emancipatory."
Living on Thin Air attempts to understand and come to terms with the "swirling forces that are shaping our economic lives," forces which Leadbeater describes as "partly malign, but potentially beneficial." It is also a call to action, a proposal to begin reconstituting our social, political and economic institutions so that they are better equipped for the new knowledge era. Leadbeater is passionate in his beliefs and engagingly articulate. His sincerity has a warmth that makes compulsive reading. Ultimately, Living on Thin Air is concerned with the task of channelling the tensions and energy between the major forces in society towards a new era of harmonious collaboration: "a society devoted to financial capitalism will be unbalanced and soulless. A society devoted to social solidarity will stagnate, lacking the dynamism of radical new ideas and the discipline of the competitive market. A society devoted totally to knowledge creation would be intelligent but poor. When these three forces of the new economy work together, they can be hugely dynamic," he concludes. It makes a provocative manifesto.
The opening chapters are constructed around reassuringly familiar subjects (Delia, fancy seeing you here! Diana, what a wonderful surprise!) imparting a self-conscious nostalgia to proceedings and if the choices are a little arbitrary, stylistically, his prose has the confidence of a man who knows his subject and believes in his ideas.
Living on Thin Air is an impressive take on the future in the global information age. Better get stocking those intellectual shelves--these goods are at a premium. --Iain Campbell
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 7 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
If you have been on a desert island for the last 10 years and have never heard of the knowledge society, knowledge workers or knowledge management, then read this book. If you are looking for something of more substance on those topics, then you may be disappointed. Leadbeater's book is as thin as its title. I bought it for two reasons. One, because two days before I didn't know who the author was but he appeared in Newsnight introduced as a new Tony Blair guru and invited to talk about the British-French war on beef. His book was quoted. Having articulated something vague about knowledge management instead of beef management, he left me puzzled. "Am I missing something here?". Second, his book hit me in a Heathrow bookshop. I bought the book for my two hour flight to Nice. By Paris I was still wondering about the "message". I landed in Nice with the book finished, a ton of red ink in its pages and a repeat of my puzzlement in front of the TV.
The author proudly warns you that the book is not an academic one. Therefore the bibliography is a pool of references at the end, which allows him to use chapter and paragraph subtitles copied form those books leaving the unfamiliar reader with the impression that there are his. Once you have gone through this highly sophisticated piece of intellectual tourism you will feel richer in trivia and poorer in thinking. You will have attended a massive week end party in the grounds of "knowledge management - a slogan for all seasons", and met "everybody", from Tony Blair to Peter Drucker. You will have had a good time and then, suddenly, you will realize: "oh God, the week end is over, Monday again, let's get serious with real life".
The author's Chinese menu approach to knowledge allows him to write 200 pages of light pseudo-connections and thousands of quotations and references that you eat without making you feel full. Like in a set Chinese menu, you are not 100% sure what those little dishes are but they look nice on the table and certainly give you a feeling of volume.
All the above is far from unsettling about Leadbeater's book or anybody's book. But, the big problem is that, in his pseudo-intellectual promenade he feels arrogant enough to dismiss the socio-political approaches of "stakeholder society" ( personified by him in Will Hutton) or the "communitarism" (personified by him in Etzioni) in a couple of short references. He even describes his thinking as a "blueprint" for the future. Leadbeater is certainly a nice guy but not a modest man. Unfortunately, his "new economy" ( as the book is sub-titled) has a much air as the title of the book. Scarier and somehow amazing is the endorsement in the book's jacket by a Prime Minister in office, Mr. Blair himself, who says that the author is " an extraordinary thinker" and the book "raises questions for Britain's future". I wonder whether those questions are about the quality of the air. There are other endorsements such as the one by Peter Mandelson ( spin doctor- UK government minister and a man of destiny who aspires to make full use of his initials, and show the world that they really stand for Prime Minister). PM says that "the book sets the agenda for the next Blair revolution". Still waiting for this one, I have plenty of time to vaccinate myself.
Revolutions can't be based on the intellectual solidity of a cream cake. Which is what this book has. My best friend suggested that the real missing reference at the end of the book was Sokal's "Intellectual impostures". Too unkind perhaps. Certainly, you need more than mastery in word processing and a Ph.D. in Word Permutation to start a revolution. Intellectual nudity will be eventually uncovered by somebody from the crowd shouting that the emperor has no clothes. If this book represents a blueprint for something, it must be a cut-and-paste society. Given the choice, I prefer the originals to Leadbeter's collage. Peter Drucker said it all a long time ago and Charles Handy dressed it up beautifully as only an Irishman can do. Charles Leadbeater is not Charles Handy and I don't think he has read Drucker either. This guru has no clothes.
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
Let me first declare an interest: I know the author and his work. And I like and admire him. So make allowances for that if you have to. But I spend my professional life reading journalistic/academic theses on political, economic and social affairs, and can spot the difference between an insight and a bag of cotton wool. "Living on thin air" has charm and a good story-teller's instinct for metaphor and popular imagery. But two features stand out in particular. First, the stories take us to places where we are challenged to upturn long-held assumptions about how bits of the world work. And second, there is an audacious sweep to this book which brings together entirely unexpected ideas, phenomena, events and insists that we see the connections between them. Anoraks who are already lined up in some corner or other of theological dispute about the knowledge society will probably not care for this book. Everyone else with any intellectual curiosity(including anyone, for instance, who bought a Brief History of Time, meaning to read it but never quite managing)should buy this book and make a new year's resolution to get to the end of it. It's not a blueprint for a revolution; it gets carried away with its optimism in parts; it doesn't tie all the ends up neatly; but it sure as hell makes you think. In fact the world will all seem a bit different afterwards, and what more could you ask for out of a book?
By A Customer
Format:Hardcover
This is one of the accounts of whats happening in the knowledge economy, and instead of the rambling opinionated material that clutters up many books in the field its grounded in a lot of evidence and clear description. Its also informed by a clear sense of some of the downsides as well as the excitement of the new economy. Highly recommended.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Stimulating, You must read this book.
If you think you know whats going on you must read this book, as you are probably wrong. It will get you thinking and and open your eyes to the future. Read more
Published on 21 Dec 2000 by laurie@gavaghan.net
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thought provoking and challenging - a must read.
Whatever you views about the hype of the new economy you will not find a more definitive treatment of the issues than this. Read more
Published on 13 Jan 2000
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good read for Uni students studying the 'new economy'
This book sets out to depend and promote the central idea of a new economy based on knowldege and innovation that will take Britian into the 21st Century. Read more
Published on 16 Dec 1999
5.0 out of 5 stars
This is the definitive book for social entrepreneurs
This book is the clearest description I have read to date of the changing society that we are now living in, in the UK. Read more
Published on 13 Dec 1999
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