What does it mean to live in an IT-ruled society?
Posted on | April 25, 2010 | No Comments
What does it mean to live in an IT-ruled society? What can the trajectory of information and communications technologies tell us about democratic participation? Below are some questions that are worth considering as we continue this unprecedented journey into a net-centric governed and managed society.
About sovereignty and control? About the conditions of play and creativity in our lives? What are the rules, procedures, and degrees of freedom structured in modern life by the preponderance of networked information machines? To what extent can voices be heard? What is the future of censorship and the protection of speech and the “press” in a digital age? How is information produced and distributed?
Can people recognize, critique, and participate in the conditions of their lives? What is the future of voting? Of electoral representation? Of constitutional parliamentary and presidential systems? Of the control and conditions of ownership of property? What is the role and future of bureaucracy? What are the conditions of eligibility in entitlement systems for health, education, and welfare?
Under what conditions and leadership can people be mobilized for collective action and reflection? How can media facilitate the engagement of people in recognition of social problems and their resolution? What media practices can garner the will of significant collections of people and direct their energies towards constructive and peaceful problem solving?
How can tensions between centralization and decentralized forms of authority and control be reconciled? What organizational forms can facilitate economic growth, maintain sustainable environments, and provide abundant opportunities for creative participation and productivity? How will IT monitor environmental conditions and identify hazards to human living? Remote sensing satellites already produce a large amount of data on crops, floods, droughts, forest conditions, and the location of natural resources.
Ⓒ ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Anthony J. Pennings, PhD is Professor of the Department of Technology and Society, State University of New York, Korea. Before joining SUNY, he taught at Hannam University in South Korea and from 2002-2012 was on the faculty of New York University. Previously, he taught at St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas, Marist College in New York, and Victoria University in New Zealand. He has also spent time as a Fellow at the East-West Center in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Tags: cybernetic conditions for democracy > economic growth > participation
Comments
Referencing this Material
About Me
Professor at State University of New York (SUNY) Korea since 2016. Moved to Austin, Texas in August 2012 to join the Digital Media Management program at St. Edwards University. Spent the previous decade on the faculty at New York University teaching and researching information systems, digital economics, and strategic communications.
You can reach me at:
apennings70@gmail.com
anthony.pennings@sunykorea.ac.kr
About me
Writings by Category
- artificial intelligence
- automatrix
- books and films
- characteristics of digital media
- creative cities
- creative industries
- crisis communications
- cultural Industries
- data analytics and meaning
- democratic political economies
- digital coordination
- digital destruction
- digital geography
- digital media economics
- digital media management
- digital monetarism
- digital spreadsheets
- disruption
- dystopian economies
- educational innovations
- electric money
- enabling frameworks
- enterprise systems
- financial news
- financial technology
- food policy and security
- futurists
- geopolitical risk
- global communications
- global e-commerce
- health IT
- how IT came to rule the world
- intellectual property
- journalism
- meaning makers
- meaningful play
- media strategies
- mobile technologies
- multimedia
- political economies in sf
- political economy of media
- science and technology studies
- sensing technologies
- smart new deal
- social media
- space systems
- strategic communications
- sustainable development
- technologies of meaning
- technology management
- telecom policy and net neutrality
- telegraphic political economy
- telelearn/telework
- the cold war
- the smith effect
- uncategorized
- visual literacy and rhetoric
Pages
Calendar
| M | T | W | T | F | S | S |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | ||||||
| 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 |
| 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 |
| 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 |
| 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 |
| 30 | 31 | |||||