Network Society

20810191 Shin Il-Ae20822174 Kim Ye-ji

CONTENTS

1. Idea of Network Society

2. The Network Society

3. Capital and Labor

4. Flows vs. Places and the Role of the Nation State

5. Critiques of the Network Society

6. Technological determinism

7. Capital and Labor

8. Conclusion

Did You Know?

Idea of Network Society

Information societyGlobal villageDigital society Wired society Post-industrial societyNetwork society

They describe the same phenomena, while others do not.

Idea of Network Society

[Manuel Castells] (1942~), Spain

Sociologist – informa-tion society and com-munication research.

One of the world’s most often-cited social sci-ence and communica-tions scholars.

Manuel Castells : “The network society is a social structure which is

characterized by net-worked communications technologies and infor-

mation processing.”

Idea of Network Society

Idea of Network Society

Timeless Time

Space of flows

Network Society

The Network Society

Information age

Annihilation of space, globalization

Horizontal corporation

Skilled flexible workers

[Features of Network Society]

InformationInforma-

tional

Essential compo-nent of all soci-eties.

key factor in eco-nomic productivity.

Informational shift to the manipula-tion of information itself.

Capital and Labor

Capital and Labor

Networked Labor

Switched-off Labor

Serves the goals of the network

· Self-programmable labor: Manage information

· Generic Labor: Deskilled, disposable

Has nothing to offer the network

In the context of the network economy is non-labor

Flow vs. Places and the Role of the Nation State

[Space of Flows]Challenges the space of places, including re-gional communities and nation states.

Networks → “Destruction of human experience”

Manuel Castells : “The inclusion/ex-clusion logic of the network switches

off people and terri-tories dubbed as ir-relevant from the

perspective of dom-inant interests”

Flow vs. Places and the Role of the Nation State

Flow vs. Places and the Role of the Nation State

[Space of places]In opposition to the space of places.

Places are condensations of human history, cul-ture and matter.

Castells “For communal identity to be a site of democratic resistance communities must reach out and build links with other communities of other cultures.”

Flow vs. Places and the Role of the Nation State

[Flows and places]

Sovereignty is ceded both upwards to the space of flows and downwards to regional and commu-nal groups.

Castells “Nation states will survive, but not so their sovereignty”

Next speaker is..

Critiques of the Network Society

Webster “his depiction of the contemporary world is so fa-miliar, even derivative.”

Target Castells' analysis of the role of information, of production, and of the relationship between in-formational labor and capitalism.

Video : Matrix

Technological determin-ism

Types of Technological determinism

Type 1 “Technology makes unexpected result and that is different with human’s intention.”

Human Technology Society

Type 2 “Technology can’t be controlled and has independent life.”

Human SocietyTechnology

Technological determin-ism

“The mode of development is technological.”

“The autonomous dynamics of technological discovery and diffusion”

“Technology is society ,and we can’t understand society except technology.”

Castells

- The relative autonomy of the mode of development became the theoretical problem.

Webster

Castells VS Webster

- Criticism centers on productivity.

“Lack of a stable calculable relationship between the value of outputs…lies behind the historical difficulties in commodifying information.” It’s difficult to integrate into a capitalist economy.

Garnham

“The network economy relies on productivity increases made possible by information technology.”

CastellsCastells VS Garnham

Technological determin-ism

Manuel Castells :

“The information age is still a capitalist age (although he suggests the informational

mode of development could survive the end of capital-ism), but it is post-capital-

ist.”

Technological determin-ism

Example : i-Pad

They didn’t conduct market research.

Korea changed the law because of i-Pad.

Economy society is changed by appearance of i-Pad.

Example : i-Pad People’s daily life is changed by i-Phone & i-Pad. -> It makes New life style. i-Pad make more Technology competi-tion.

I didn’t conduct market re-search.

I’m changing the world just through the innova-

tion.

Much of the power of capital has been appropriated by informa-tional (self-programmable) labor, particularly those actors who are at the juncture of different net-works.

This is very similar to the con-cept of a meritocracy, in which individuals have power in pro-portion to their knowledge, skills, or the value of their la-bor.

Capital and Labor

The function fulfilled by the capitlist is no more than the function of capital executed con-sciously and willingly. The capitalist functions only as personified cap-ital, capital as a person, just as the worker is no more than labor person-ified.

Capital and Labor

Conclusion

The familiarity of Casteels’ analysis, and the connections he draws between the disparate phenomena and factors he examines, is valuable.

Webster and Garnham present credible critiques of Casteels’ concept of an information age.

The network society is more convincingly a development of industrial society than an entirely new construct.

Conclusion

Castells does seem to be of two minds!!!

He describes it as enabling rather than determining

“ The internationalization of the economy is only pos-sible because of information technology.”

Garnham and webster are correct that Castells seems to be elevating technoloty to a priviledged topic of

analysis.

Thank you^_^*