| Information and communication technologies lie at the heart of one of today's predominant ideological discourses—an idea that information and communication technologies will transform not only the way people work within organizations, via “the rise of human networks and the fall of hierarchies,” but also the very way that people within those organizations “think about who they are” (Garreau, 1999: A1).; The National Partnership for Reinventing Government (NPR) makes extensive use of this empowerment discourse (Kettl and DiIulio, 1995)—inferring that federal employees will benefit from greater freedom, participation, and equality in the workplace as modern information and communication technologies spread (NPR, 1998a, 1997a, 1993a). This research identifies, using critical discourse analysis, whether these intimations of empowerment are the predominant ideology at the core of NPR's discourse on information and communication technologies, or if some other ideology predominates. |
