According to Professor Shils, technological change has implications for the balance that individuals find between individual or private goals and responsibilities as a public citizen. The political requirements of a modern technological society seem to call for more emphasis on public responsibility. The power blackout in the northeastern United States showed how widespread and concentrated the effects of advanced technology can be. Private Firms and Public Goods Corporations play a key role in developing technology. According to Galbraith, corporations and market forces are better at providing for and creating private wants than they are at satisfying public needs.
Technological change seems to require a shift of emphasis from corporation to government.
More and more emphasis is being put on technical processes of decision-making by using sophisticated computer and statistical technologies. This seems to put more and more administrative control in the hands of technical experts. However, this cause difficulties for tradiitonal values of popular and participatory democracy. Scientific management of the opportunities and problems arising from technology has both positive and negative consequences. We need new institutions and social structures to deal with the management of the opportunities and problems of technology.