Information Technology, Globalization and Social Development

UNRISD Discussion Paper No. 114, September 1999, Manuel Castells

      There is a raging debate in the world on the mixed record of the information technology revolution, and of globalization—especially when we consider their social dimensions on a planetary scale. As is always the case with a fundamental debate, it is most often framed ideologically and cast in simplistic terms. For the prophets of technology, for the true believers in the magic of the market, everything will be just fine, as long as ingenuity and competition are set free. All we need are a few regulatory fixes, to prevent corruption and to remove bureaucratic impediments in the path of our flight to hyper-modernity. For those around the world who are not ecstatic about surfing on the Internet, but who are affected by layoffs, lack of basic social services, crime, poverty and disruption of their lives, globalization is nothing more than a warmed up version of traditional capitalist ideology. In their view, information technology is a tool for renewed exploitation, destruction of jobs, environmental degradation and the invasion of privacy. Techno-elites versus neo-luddites.

      Of course, the real issues are not in-between, but elsewhere. Social development today is determined by the ability to establish a synergistic interaction between technological innovation and human values, leading to a new set of organizations and institutions that create positive feedback loops between productivity, flexibility, solidarity, safety, participation and accountability, in a new model of development that could be socially and environmentally sustainable.

      It is easy to agree on these goals, but difficult to develop the policies and strategies that could lead to them. Some of the disagreement comes, certainly, from conflicting interests, values and priorities. But a considerable source of current disarray in social and economic policies stems from the lack of a common understanding of the processes of transformation under way, of their origins and their implications. This paper aims to clarify the meaning of this transformation, particularly by focusing on the processes that are usually considered to be its triggers: the information technology revolution and the process of globalization. As we shall see, in fact, these two processes interact with others, in a very complex set of actions and reactions. But they offer a fruitful entry point to discuss the connection between the new socio-economic system and the generation of inequality and social exclusion on an unprecedented, planetary scale.

      Thus, after having characterized technological innovation, organizational change and globalization, I will analyse the various dimensions of inequality and social exclusion, showing the depth of our social crisis, and I will provide some hypotheses on the reasons for its accentuation in the last decade. I will conclude by proposing a redefinition of the field of social development, appropriate to tackle the issues that condition our capacity to live together in the new context of the “information age”. In proceeding along the lines of this argument, I have in mind a variety of data, from reliable sources, that make somewhat plausible the analysis presented here. However, since I have just published a book that brings together many of these data, I take the liberty of referring the reader to it, in order to concentrate here on the schematic presentation (and expanded elaboration) of my argument without repeating the presentation of data sources (see Castells, 1996, 1997 and 1998 as well as the synthesis of data on world poverty presented in UNDP, 1997).

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