Information Technology, Globalization and Social Development

Summary
· Manuel Castells examines the profile of this new world, centred around multinational corporations, global financial markets and a highly concentrated system of technological research and development
· The reintegration of social development and economic growth in the information age will require massive technological upgrading of countries, firms and households around the world
· It will require the establishment of a worldwide network of science and technology, in which the most advanced universities will be willing to share knowledge and expertise for the common good.

Introduction
· For those around the world who are not ecstatic about surfing on the Internet, information technology is a tool for renewed exploitation, destruction of jobs, environmental degradation and the invasion of privacy
· Social development today is determined by the ability to establish a synergistic interaction between technological innovation and human values,
THE NEW SOCIO-ECONOMIC SYSTEM: INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, NETWORKING, GLOBALIZATION
· It is new because it is tooled by new information and communication technologies that are at the roots of new productivity sources, of new organizational forms, and of the formation of a global economy
INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY AS A STRATEGIC TOOL
· The entire realm of human activity depends on the power of information, in a sequence of technological innovation that accelerates its pace by month.
· Software development is making possible user-friendly computing, so that millions of children, when provided with adequate education, can progress in their knowledge, and in their ability to create wealth and enjoy it wisely
· The availability and use of information and communication technologies are a pre-requisite for economic and social development in our world
· Ict allows countries to leapfrog stages of economic growth by being able to modernize their production systems and increase their competitiveness faster than in the past
· For those economies that are unable to adapt to the new technological system, their retardation becomes cumulative.
· The ability to move into the Information Age depends on the capacity of the whole society to be educated, and to be able to assimilate and process complex information
GLOBALIZATION
· Global economy is an economy whose core activities work as a unit in real time on a planetary scale
· Savings and investment in all countries depend for their performance on the evolution and behavior of global financial markets
· Globalization requires capitalist restructuring, innovation and competition, and enacted through the powerful medium of new information and communication technologies.
NETWORKING
· With new information and communication technology, the network is, at the same time, centralized and decentralized.
· Networks are the appropriate organization for the relentless adaptation and the extreme flexibility that is required by an interconnected, global economy
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE INFORMATION AGE: INEQUALITY, POVERTY, MISERY AND SOCIAL EXCLUSION
· Relationships of consumption refer to the appropriation by people of the product of their work
· The number of people living in poverty has significantly increased everywhere.
· The first process, characterizing the information age as a result of its networking form of organization, is the growing individualization of labour
· A second characteristic of current relationships of production is over-exploitation
· A third characteristic is social exclusion, that is the process by which certain individuals or groups are barred from access to social positions
· There is a fourth significant type of relationship of production that is relevant to current trends of social underdevelopment
THE FOURTH WORLD
· information and knowledge have always been essential factors in power and production
· It is the entire social organization that becomes productive or, on the contrary, an obstacle for innovation, and thus for productivity growth
· The reintegration of social development and economic growth through technological innovation, informational management, and shared world development will not be accomplished by simply relying on unfettered market forces.
· It will require massive technological upgrading of countries, firms, and households around the world.
· Solidarity in a globalized world means global solidarity. And it also means inter-generational solidarity