ABSTRACT
Surveillance has been a perennial concern for historians, philosophers, social scientists, and, more recently, business and management scholars. Things are very different now in a world of electronic performance monitoring, social media, and apparently unlimited self-disclosure from what they were when surveillance at work appeared to be solely the formal responsibility of authority figures like foremen, overseers, floorwalkers, gang masters, and charge-hands. The word surveillance itself appears to have entered the English language at the very beginning of the eighteenth century when the tensions between France and Great Britain were high due to a generalized fear inspired by the French Revolution. Surveillance may involve physical watching, but today it is more likely to be automated. Thus it makes personal data visible to organizations, even if persons are in transit, and it also allows for comparing and classifying data. This chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
