INTRODUCTION HISTORY OF INFORMATION SOCIETY The collocation “information society” as it is now used first emerged in Japanese social science(s) in the early 1960’s. The Japanese version of the expression (joho shakai, johoka shakai) was born during a conversation in 1961 between Kisho Kurokawa, the famous architect, and Tudao Umesao, the renowned historian and anthropologist. It debuted in written texts as the title of a study published in January 1964. The author was the aforementioned Jiro Kamishima but the title was given to the study by the editor Michiko Igarashi (Sociology in Information Societies).
Three authors are in competition to win the imaginary award for being the first to use the collocation “information society” in their book’s title and due to the reconstruction difficulties in regard to the dates of preparation and publication of the manuscripts, it is almost impossible to decide which publication was the first: Yujiro Hayashi’s bestseller of 1969 (Johoka Shakai: Hado No Shakai Kara Sofuto no Shakai e, The Information Society: From Hard to Soft Society) or the introductory and popularising books by Yoneji Masuda and Konichi Kohyma published in 1968 (Joho Shakai Nyumon – Introduction to an Information Society).
However, there is no doubt at all that the birth and fast consolidation of the concept is linked inexorably to the island country: as early as 1971 a systematising “dictionary” on information society was published in Japan (Johoka Shakai Jiten, Dictionary of Information Societies). The first English language reference dates from 1970 and can also be linked to Yoneji Masuda, who used the expression in his lecture at a conference (it Information Society – what is it exactly? (The meaning, history and conceptual framework of an expression) appeared in print in the same year).
Of course all of this does not imply that the literature (in English) of the information society does not have even earlier antecedents. It was just that different expressions were used for the newly emerged social-economic entity, namely post-industrial society and white collar revolution. A common characteristic of these proto-concepts is that they isolated one of the components, i. e. one part, ofthe rapidly changing economic-social complex and suggested that it was sufficient to describe –in both a descriptive and metaphorical sense – the whole.
As a result of this, several dozen terms, each with a different approach, proliferated between 1950 and 1980 and then – in our opinion around 1980 – they merged into a comprehensive, joint umbrella term combining the concept of information and society: this new concept included and encapsulated all the previous partial concepts and even preserved the expressive power, approach and attitude they represented. The expression “post-industrial society ” was coined in 1914 in Great Britain by Ananda K.
Coomaraswamy and Arthur J. Penty, and later revived from 1958 in America (primarily by Daniel Bell) and from the end of the 1960s in French social sciences (likewise by Alan Touraine). At the beginning observers used it in a strongly normative (what should it be like? ) or strongly predictive (what will it be like? ) sense, but a shared presupposition of the authors was the accelerating “decomposition” and transformation of those industrial structures that had developed over a period of some two hundred years.
Another aspect of the same structural changes was analyzed by the Australian economist Colin Clark, who introduced the concept “the third (tertiary) sector” in 1940, drawing attention to the growing importance of services as opposed to material production (service economy=tertiary sector). In regard to technology, which forms the basis of production, the term “automation” (later “cybernation”), introduced by the automotive engineer of the Ford company D.
S. Harder in 1946, facilitated the discussions for decades, and dozens of evocative terms were originated to designate the sweeping changes generated by the hurtling development of information technology, Of these the most well-known were the various manifestations of the computer and the scientific-technological revolution. The term “brain work” replaced “manual work” and opened the way towards the concept of information society.
This was identified by the economist Alfred Marshall and the social philosopher and revolutionary Peter Kropotkin at about the same time, around 1890. For a while the word “intelligentsia” (“intelligence”), which spread in German-speaking areas after 1848 and in Russian-speaking areas after 1860, seemed to be a lucky choice to express the growing importance of those social groups in the labour market that emerged who were using their intellectual performance and knowledge to make a living.
However, because of the increasing ideological “interference” connected to the word, the term “white-collar work” spread more widely in the 1950s and it also became an “official” term used to denote a basic category in statistics and employment. At first the term, created by Upton Sinclair in 1919, was used exclusively for office workers and those officials who moved from manufacturing industry towards intellectual work; however, later it was extended to workers who carried out activities requiring certain (mainly high) qualifications.
Interestingly, it took a long time for teachers and scientists to “make it” into this category; this happened only at the beginning of the 1960s. Not long after this, the term knowledge worker was coined in 1967 by Peter Drucker. From the end of the 1960s until the beginning of the 1980s it seemed that the term “post-industrial society” would become an umbrella term used to describe the major social transformation that had taken place, but the term became more and more contradictory and vague.
On the one hand, the “traditional manufacturing industry based on manual work” was never the same as “industry”: it was Fritz Machlup, one of the pioneers of the information society discourse, who, using the language of economics, showed at the beginning of the 1960s that the production of knowledge is an economic activity and could be described with the terms used in the analysis of the industrial sector. He defined a unified knowledge industry by organizing a structure using more than 30 industries. He reviewed the conceptual field, and then described one of its sectors, the knowledge producing sector, in detail.
Finally, he pointed out that the biggest and most important sector of this industry was education. However, due to the increasingly complicated patterns of information, knowledge processes and institutes, other terms became successively unsuitable since they tried to balance the growing complexity of production by including the quaternary and quandary sectors. Neither term, “white-collar” nor “brain work” was able to reflect the process by which knowledge itself was upgraded in the case of each worker and by which traditional industries became increasingly information and knowledge intensive.
Furthermore, “post-industrialist” had the secondary meaning of “post-capitalist”, which presented a problem since the capitalist foundation had not changed in spite of the many fundamental internal realignments concerning mainly the proprietary, power, and welfare dimensions. In the end the term “information society”, which was the umbrella term used to describe the elemental social changes that took place in the second half of the 20th century, remained alone in the ring.
But not for long: the term quickly filtered through to the political sphere and the language of the media, and as a result of this it has had to face multiple challenges ever since. INFORMATION SOCIETY DEFINITION Information society is defined as a new form of social existence in which the storage, production and flow of networked information. Information society is a post-industrial society in which information technology (IT) is transforming every aspect of cultural, political, and social life and which is based on the production and distribution of information.
It is based on the production and distribution of information. It is a term used to describe the most recent stage of social history. Information society studies is an area of science that emerged in the 1990s for the systematic study of information society issues and its ‘’translation’’ into higher education curricula. Post-industrial society means the term was the most frequently used one before the expression ‘’information society gained overall acceptance.
Social informatics is a strongly interdisciplinary research field exploring the meso- and micro levels of information society and the social issues pertaining to telecommunication and computing. White collar revolution – Jean Gottmann used this expression for the title of Chapter 11 of his book Mega polis, published in 1961. By the turn of the millennium the use of the concept information society had already become widespread and was not only an everyday term in the social science vocabulary but was a term preferred by those involved in political planning, political marketing and in the world of business.
In the 20th century the most developed countries gradually entered the state of information society and it is expected that within a matter of a few decades the majority of the world’s population will be living and working in a global information society. The concept “information society” as a political and ideological construct has developed under the direction of neo-liberal globalization, whose main goal has been to accelerate the establishment of an open and “self-regulated” world market.
In fact, at the end of the century, when the majority of the developed countries had already adopted ICT infrastructure development policies, there is a spectacular peak in the share market of the communications industry CHARACTERISTICS OF INFORMATION SOCIETY Information society gives a pervasive influence of IT on home, work, and recreational aspects of the individual’s daily routine. It is a stratification into new classes those who are information-rich and those who are information-poor.
Information society also loosening of the nation state’s hold on the lives of individuals and the rise of highly sophisticated criminals who can steal identities and vast sums of money through information related (cyber) crime. FEATURES OF INFORMATION SOCIETY 1. ICT based 2. Change in communication pattern (e –mail, teleconferencing, and virtual office) 3. Information utilities (smart card, virtual education) 4. Borderless information (open sky concept) 5. Intellectual based industry (value is increase by knowledge, not labor) 6. Service industry 7. Knowledge workers . Global village 9. Network community 10. Source of power is information in the hands of many as opposed to an industrial society where the strategic source is capital. SOME RISING ISSUES REGARDING INFORMATION SOCIETY One of the greatest challenges of establishing information society is the effort to eliminate global property. The development of an information society is highly complex many of us are unprepared for the needs, challenges and opportunities presented by the information age. The ICT also gives impact to the world trade like the internet will facilitate ross-selling product. As a result, the big company will invest more money on the establishment of international trade. A growing disparity, between information rich and information poor. digital divide. Availability of basic infrastructure and ICT are the some other issues. In summary, Information society is based on these traits. First is the technology. Sophisticated IT for the production, recording, transmission and retrieval of information of all formats bringing about the high levels of interconnectedness, globalization and dependence on IT.
Secondly, extensive production of information coupled with high proportions of the labor force employed directly and directly in information activities. Third, in economy sector, information being a major commodity, being bought and sold extensively. Fourth, Operation. Integrated channels and appliances for the handling of information at large may replace specialized channels and appliances for the handling of specific forms of electronic information. Lastly, Culture. The economic and social accent on information has turned it to be a culture shrinking time and space constraints and the emergence of global virtual symbolism and realities.
CHANGES IN SOCIETY Information society began with the use of mainframe computers to access vast amounts of information. Creation, distribution and manipulation of information became the most significant economic and cultural activity in the evolving information society. While, knowledge society is creating, sharing, and using of knowledge to bring prosperity and a sense of well-being to its people. “Value added”. We also define knowledge as active and dynamic information. KNOWLEDGE SOCIETY DEFINITION Knowledge Society refers to any society where knowledge is the primary production resource instead of capital and labor.
It may also refer to the use a certain society gives to information. A Knowledge society creates shares and uses knowledge for the prosperity and well-being of its people”. CHARACTERISTIC OF KNOWLEDGE SOCIETY Knowledge societies have the characteristic that knowledge forms a major component of any human activity. Economic, social, cultural, and all other human activities become dependent on a huge volume of knowledge and information. A knowledge society is one in which knowledge becomes a major creative force.
Knowledge societies are not a new occurrence. For example, fishermen have long shared the knowledge of predicting the weather to their community and this knowledge gets added to the social capital of the community. What is new is that ?With current technologies, knowledge societies need not be constrained by geographic proximity ? Current technology offers much more possibilities for sharing, archiving and retrieving knowledge ? Knowledge has become the most important capital in the present age, and hence the success of any society lies in harnessing it.
EXAMPLES OF SOCIETIES THAT CAN BLOSSOM TO KNOWLEDGE SOCIETIES People from the same field ?Teachers teaching the same subject. ?Fans of the same musical group ?Artists with similar interests People from different fields ?Engineers talking to scientists about a scientific issue related to their engineering project ? Researchers of different fields discussing a common research problem ? Artists interested in fractals getting in touch with programmers DEFINING SCOPE OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES (ICTS)
The driving forces of the information revolution and the ‘information society’ are the development, diffusion and use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in contemporary societies. ICTs refer to the various technologies that enhance the creation, storage, processing, communication and dissemination of information. ICTs also refer to the different infrastructures used in these processes, their applications and the numerous services these infrastructures render. We identify the following technologies as the elements of ICTs: Media of Communication (e. . radio, television,) Information machine (e. g. Computers). Telecommunications technologies and equipment (Satellites, fiber optic cables, phones, facsimiles machines) the development in telecommunications has impacted enormously on the applications of ICTs and their uses. K- ECONOMY The K- economy refers to knowledge economy also refers to the use of knowledge technologies (such as knowledge engineering and knowledge management) to produce economic benefits is about knowledge and ability to use it and to create new knowledge value and wealth.
Wealth is measured by the results of knowledge that is inventively applied. Three things to do to prepare for K- economy are have sound knowledge about a particular discipline. Have the skills to apply that knowledge and inculcate proper values and attitudes in you. The reality of K-economy is customers are increasingly knowledgeable. The environment is complex. The ability to navigate and utilize information and learn new skills is key success factors. Values have changed and the focus should be in creating and using intellectual assets. INFORMATION PROFESSIONALS IN THE KNOWLEDGE SOCIETY
Information professionals are responsible for the capture, management and transfer of information and knowledge within and organization. Information specialist, documentation specialist, information / database manager and etc need to understand the business of their enterprise and how they should fit into overall enterprise structure. They also need to knowledgeable and flexible in adapting application of new technologies to their enterprise. THE ANALOGY OF THE GROWING PLANT OF INFORMATION SOCIETY Society grows its roots of development through the cooperative support of individuals, organizations, and tools.
Information Professionals grow as plants to be part of the Knowledge World with the same support of individuals, organizations, and tools. CONCLUSION As a result of this approach is the conceptual network that can be explained along with a general understanding of information society. With the brief history of the information society and examines the relationship between the concept and related notions such as knowledge society and K- economy. Information society is very important. Information society really gives a pervasive influence of IT on home, work, and recreational aspects of the individual’s daily routine.
It is a stratification into new classes those who are information-rich and those who are information-poor. However, knowledge society is the primary production resource instead of capital and labor. It may also refer to the use a certain society gives to information. A Knowledge society “creates shares and uses knowledge for the prosperity and well-being of its people. As a conclusion, in such a connected world, information society and knowledge society are two assets we must count on because they are key to success.
