Seeing Like a Supply Chain

A history of the technology of supply-chain management from punch cards to neural nets, and how the ambiguity built into that technology helps companies and exploits workers

Seeing Like a Supply Chain is a compelling investigation into the hidden networks that drive our global economy. Miriam Posner presents a blow-by-blow account of the technology of supply-chain management from punch cards to neural nets, revealing how the system’s built-in ambiguity shields companies from accountability while exploiting workers.

Drawing on more than a decade of research, Posner shows how computation converged with the growth of global trade to allow for a lightning-quick, astoundingly efficient supply chain that lets corporations source products without any notion of where their goods are actually being produced. At a time when multinational firms fear the reputational damage of human rights violations in the making of their products, the supply chain’s shroud of vagueness is a feature, not a bug. Posner shows how this is technically accomplished—and how the strategic disavowal of information extends through every step of that chain.