Network Society Essay ⋆ Political Science Essay Examples ⋆ EssayEmpire

Network society, which some call technological society and others virtual community, is a society in which technological media shape the primary modes of social, economic, and even political organization. The rise of network society began with the telegraph, radio, and telephone, but the growth of ever more effective and pervasive forms of communication (cell phones, computers, iPods, webcams, etc.) at the dawn of the twenty-first century has led to an unprecedented ubiquity of connectivity. The global interconnection of computers through the Internet (or World Wide Web) provides a 24/7 (24 hours a day/7 days a week) link to the rest of the world.

The network society manifests itself economically in the burgeoning of online shopping, electronic banking, electronic bill paying, and the pervasive reshaping of the business environment as office employees do much of their daily work using the Internet. Socially, the network society is marked by constant electronic access to friends, colleagues, and likeminded affinity groups. New social networking platforms, from Facebook and My Space to blogs and Twitter, can grow in months to household names and essential aspects of life for people (especially young people) in advanced economies.

Impact Of Network Society On Politics

The flowering of the network society has already begun to impact politics, making it a fertile area for future political science research. Most directly, many European governments as well as those of Australia, Brazil, Canada, India, and Venezuela have made it possible to vote and to pay taxes online. E-mail creates a new and possibly more direct point of access to politicians, and advocacy groups are able to coordinate online petitions and communication to candidates with greater ease. It is quite common for politicians and citizens to create movements, raise money, and organize major electoral campaigns via the Internet. What has come to be known as “information politics” shows the power of the network. Traditional movements have been enhanced by access to online methods of direct contact mobilization as in the case of fundraising for the Obama campaign, which made it possible to raise millions of dollars on the basis of $25.00 online contributions. There is also digital direct action, which makes possible the nonviolent aspect of global civil society that employs technology in its world campaigns. It is said that techno politics makes it possible for the anarchist to have common cause with trade unionists, ecologists with farmers, intellectuals with church groups, and so forth. Yet, for the most part, even though network society seems to be inspirational and exhilarating, it is still only a minor irritant as a global movement.

Advantages And Disadvantages Of The Network Society

Assessing the advantages and disadvantages of the network society began in the 1990s with the work of scholars like Castells, van Dijk, and Rheingold. One advantage of network society is that it seems to grant the individual more freedom to choose to which communities to belong, albeit virtually. Technological community or network society for some may be an enriching form of social interaction that allows for some commitment to the society but does not require the total commitment of being a face-to-face member of today’s society.

Another advantage of the network society is the presence of up-to-the-minute information through a variety of sources, which should enable actors (including political actors) to make more informed decisions. This connectivity becomes especially important to evade government censorship in situations of oppression such as those in Tiananmen Square, Iran, and Myanmar; anyone with a cell phone can provide live camera footage of events as, or immediately after, they occur. Network technology can be a tool for citizens to ask government for better information and to become more involved in political decision making, thus bringing about the phenomena of netizens and netizenship—citizens of the network and network citizenship.

On the other hand, some analysts criticize the ideal of having the freedom to choose to become part of the virtual community, because individuals can easily opt out and thereby fail to form a genuine “society.” In fact, the complexity of social networks and information can cause fragmentation, where each person finds a social niche and no longer needs to engage beyond it. If the more advantaged have the possibility to use their connectivity for political mobilization, they also have an unprecedented opportunity to use it for diversion. Further, the scope of network society is limited by a digital divide that leaves many segments of society behind. The poor in advanced countries and the majority in developing countries have no access to the tools of connectivity and hence have no choice, and some argue this digital divide will continue through the twenty-first century with profound negative consequences.

Moreover, it is unclear what results actually come from the new technology. Despite all the faxes and text messages during the suppression of student riots in 1989 in Tiananmen, China still remains an authoritarian regime. In 2009, the opposition in Iran mobilized and was observed worldwide through network technology, but President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad remained in power. The segments of that country connected to the network society have not and maybe cannot generate a movement capable of regime change. More generally, if becoming part of the virtual community/network society is an individual choice, whether it translates to a strong enough force to bring about changes becomes a vital political question.

Further, the “freedom” of information and communication on the Internet is actually subject to substantial control in totalitarian regimes. Not only can governments monitor their citizens through all kinds of requirements for registrations and data mining facilitated by the computer, but large portions of the Internet are censored in countries like China, Burma/ Myanmar, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, andVietnam, according to the 2008 listing of the Kassandra Project.

Tapscott indicated that to not go online is to choose antiquation, anachronism, ant progressiveness. And the choice may need to be made by the individual much sooner than later.

Bibliography:

Bell, Daniel. “The Social Framework of the Information Society.” In The Computer Age, Michael L. Dertouzos and Joel Moses. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1979.
Castells, Manuel. The Network Society: A Cross-Cultural Perspective. Cheltenham, U.K.: Edward Elgar, 2004
The Rise of the Network Society. Oxford: Blackwell, 2000.
Forester,Tom. High-Tech Society: The Story of the Information Technology Revolution. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1987.
Hassan, Robert. Media, Politics and the Network Society. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2004.
Hassan, Robert, and Ronald Purser. 24/7:Time and Temporality in the Network Society. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007.
Lievrow, Leah A., and Sonia Livingstone, eds. The Handbook of New Media. Thousand Oaks, Calif.: Sage, 2002.
Rheingold, Howard. The Virtual Community. Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1993.
Shivard, Steven. Connected, or, What It Means to Live in the Network Society. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2003.
Tapscott, Don. Growing Up Digital. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1997.
van Dijk, Jan A. G. M. The Network Society: Social Aspects of a New Media. Thousand Oaks, Calif: Sage, 2006.
Willson, Michele. Technically Together. New York: Peter Lang, 2002.

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