Information society

An information society is a society in which the creation, distribution, diffusion, use, integration and manipulation of information is a significant economic, political, and cultural activity. The knowledge economy is its economic counterpart whereby wealth is created through the economic exploitation of understanding. People that have the means to partake in this form of society is sometimes called digital citizens.

Specific to this kind of society is the central position information technology has for production, economy, and society at large. Information society is seen as the successor to industrial society. Closely related concepts are the post-industrial society (Daniel Bell), post-fordism, post-modern society, knowledge society, Telematic Society, Information Revolution, and network society (Manuel Castells).

Development of the information society model

One of the first people to develop the concept of the information society was the economist Fritz Machlup. In 1933 Machlup began studying the effect of patents on research. His work culminated in the breakthrough study “The production and distribution of knowledge in the United States” in 1962. This book was widely regarded and was eventually translated into Russian and Japanese. The Japanese have also studied the information society Johoka Shakai (Umesao), which means the highest stage of societal evolution seen in analogy to biological evolution. This concept was discussed already in the 1950s and 1960s. [1]

Further reading

• Manuel Castells (2000) The Rise of the Network Society. The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture. Volume 1. Malden: Blackwell. Second Edition.
• Michael Dawson/John Bellamy Foster (1998) Virtual Capitalism. In: Robert W. McChesney/Ellen Meiksins Wood/John Bellamy Foster (Eds.) (1998) Capitalism and the Information Age. New York: Monthly Review Press. pp. 51–67.
• Esther Dyson/George Gilder/George Keyworth/Alvin Toffler (1994) Cyberspace and the American Dream: A Magna Carta for the Knowledge Age. In: Future Insight 1.2. The Progress & Freedom Foundation.
• Tony Fitzpatrick (2002) Critical Theory, Information Society and Surveillance Technologies. In: Information, Communication and Society. Vol. 5. No. 3. pp. 357–378.
• Christian Fuchs (2008) Internet and Society: Social Theory in the Information Age. New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-96132-7.
• Christian Fuchs (2007) Transnational Space and the ’Network Society’. In: 21st Century Society. Vol. 2. No. 1. pp. 49–78.
• Christian Fuchs (2005) Emanzipation! Technik und Politik bei Herbert Marcuse. Aachen: Shaker.
• Christian Fuchs (2004) The Antagonistic Self-Organization of Modern Society. In: Studies in Political Economy, No. 73 (2004), pp. 183– 209.
• Michael Hardt/Antonio Negri (2005) Multitude. War and Democracy in the Age of the Empire. New York: Hamish Hamilton.
• Michael Hardt/Antonio Negri Empire. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• David Harvey (1989) The Condition of Postmodernity. London: Blackwell.
• Fritz Machlup (1962) The Production and Distribution of Knowledge in the United States. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
• OECD (1986) Trends in The Information Economy. Paris: OECD.
• OECD (1981) Information Activities, Electronics and Telecommunications Technologies: Impact on Employment, Growth and Trade. Paris: OECD.
• Peter Otto/Philipp Sonntag (1985) Wege in die Informationsgesellschaft. München. dtv.
• Radovan Richta (1977) The Scientific and Technological Revolution and the Prospects of Social Development. In: Ralf Dahrendorf (Ed.) (1977) Scientific-Technological Revolution. Social Aspects. London: Sage. pp. 25–72.
• Dan Schiller (2000) Digital Capitalism. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
• Rudi Schmiede (2006a) Knowledge, Work and Subject in Informational Capitalism. In: Berleur, Jacques/Nurminen, Markku I./Impagliazzo, John (Eds.) (2006) Social Informatics: An Information Society for All? New York: Springer. pp. 333–354.
• Rudi Schmiede (2006b) Wissen und Arbeit im “Informational Capitalism”. In: Baukrowitz, Andrea et al. (Eds.) (2006) Informatisierung der Arbeit – Gesellschaft im Umbruch. Berlin: Edition Sigma. pp. 455–488.
• Nico Stehr (1994) Arbeit, Eigentum und Wissen. Frankfurt/Main: Suhrkamp.
• Nico Stehr (2002a) A World Made of Knowledge. Lecture at the Conference “New Knowledge and New Consciousness in the Era of the Knowledge Society”, Budapest, January 31 2002. Online: [3]
• Nico Stehr (2002b) Knowledge & Economic Conduct. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
• Alain Touraine (1988) Return of the Actor. Minneapolis. University of Minnesota Press.
• Jan Van Dijk (2006) The Network Society. London: Sage. Second Edition.
• Yannis Veneris (1984) The Informational Revolution, Cybernetics and Urban Modelling, PhD Thesis, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK.
• Yannis Veneris (1990) Modeling the transition from the Industrial to the Informational Revolution, Environment and Planning A 22(3):399-416. [4]
• Frank Webster (2002a) The Information Society Revisited. In: Lievrouw, Leah A./Livingstone, Sonia (Eds.) (2002) Handbook of New Media. London: Sage. pp. 255–266.
• Frank Webster (2002b) Theories of the Information Society. London: Routledge.
• Frank Webster (2006) Theories of the Information Society. 3rd edition. London: Routledge
• Wark, McKenzie (1997) The Virtual Republic, Allen & Unwin, St Leonards, p22-29

Links

• Special Report – “Information Society: The Next Steps”
• Knowledge Assessment Methodology – interactive country-level data for the information society and knowledge economy
• The origin and development of a concept: the information society.
• Global Information Society Project at the World Policy Institute
• I/S: A Journal of Law and Policy for the Information Society – Ohio State law journal which addresses legal aspects related to the information society.
• [5] – Participation in the Broadband Society. European network on social and technical research on the emerging information society.

Wikibooks : UNDP-APDIP Books

• The Information Age

This e-primer provides a comprehensive review of the digital and information and communications technology revolutions and how they are changing the economy and society. The primer also addresses the challenges arising from the widening digital divide.

• Legal and Regulatory Issues in the Information Economy

Other Relevant Books

• The Information Society Library: Getting the Best out of Cyberspace, DiploFoundation
• Gelbstein, E. (2006) Crossing the Executive Digital Divide. DiploFoundation, ISBN 99932-53-17-0

This guide is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia.