Awards

• Winner of Manuel Castells was awarded the Holberg International Memorial Prize in 2012.

Overview

The Web has been with us for less than a decade. The popular and commercial diffusion of the Internet has been extraordinary-instigating and enabling changes in virtually every area of human activity and society. We have new systems of communication, new businesses, new media and sources of information, new forms of political and cultural expression, new forms of teaching and learning, and new communities. But how much do we know about the Internet-its history, its technology, its culture, and its uses? What are its implications for the business world and society at large? The diffusion has been so rapid that it has outpaced the capacity for well-grounded analysis. Some say everything will change, others that little will change. Manuel Castells is widely regarded as the leading analyst of the Information Age and the Network Society. In addition to his academic work, he acts as adviser at the highest inter-national levels. In this short, accessible, and informative book he brings his experience and knowledge to bear on the Internet Galaxy. How did it all begin? What are the cultures that make up and contest the Internet? How is it shaping the new business organization and re-shaping older business organizations? What are the realities of the digital divide? How has the Internet affected social and cultural organization, political participation and communication, and urban living? These are just some of the questions addressed in this much needed book. Castells avoids any predictions or prescriptions-there have been enough of those-but instead draws on an extraordinary range of detailed evidence and research to describe what is happening, and to help us understand how the Internet has become the medium of the new network society.

Full Product Details

9780199241538

Table of Contents

Reviews

Attempting an academic survey of the internet is an heroic task ... Manuel Castells is better placed than most to attempt such an undertaking, and pulls it off with verve and clarity. RSA Journal Authoritative guide to the origins of the internet, how it is affecting every area of human life, and its business applications. Sunday Times Books of the Year 2001 This small but complete volume is a critical introduction to internet-related theories, while doubling as a simplified reader on his own ideas. The book should help to spread his influence beyond the faithful. Prospect The Internet Galaxy is the best attempt by a big thinker to grapple with the net's long-term implications for our society. Mark Leonard, New Statesman The Internet is shaping society and in turn being shaped by society. It takes a scholar of Manuel Castells's range to do justice to this phenomenon. His book is learned without being pompous, and insightful without being impenetrable. If we ever get a discipline of Internet studies, this will be one of its founding texts. John Naughton, author of A Brief History of the Future: The Origins of the Internet Manuel Castells has proved once again that he has an unmatched synoptic capacity to make sense of the complexities of a networked world, and here writes with clarity and insight about everything from the history of the technology to the subcultures that have done so much to shape it. Geoff Mulgan, author of Communications and Control and Connexity Director of the Performance and Innovation Unit, The Cabinet Office and head of the Prime Minister's Forward Strategy Unit Thoroughly researched and truly global in scope. Castells provides balanced covergae of e-business and the new economy: the politics of the Internet, including privacy and freedom: and the geography of the Internet. Highly recommended for academic libraries. Library Journal [An] excellent, readable, nontechnical summary of the history, social implications and likely future of Internet business. Publishers Weekly Castells is probably the world's most highly regarded commentator on the information age and new economic order. Management Today: Guru Guide Adam Smith explained how capitalism worked, and Karl Marx explained why it didn't. Now the social and economic relations of the Information Age have been captured by Manuel Castells. The Wall Street Journal A readable, articulate and persuasive account of why the internet's most powerful impacts on the shape of business, politics and society may be yet to come. Castells is the nearest thing the internet has to a founding philosopher. Charles Leadbetter - Financial Times

Far-reaching analysis by the author of the Information Age trilogy ( The Rise of the Network Society , not reviewed, etc.) of the Internet's birth and its impact on a range of human activities, including business, social relationships, and politics. Castells (Planning and Sociology/Univ. of California, Berkeley) begins his study by looking at the creation of the Internet, developed not by business but in government institutions, universities, think tanks, and research centers: environments that fostered freedom of thinking and innovation. Its origins, he points out, are what have given the Internet its most distinctive features, openness in technical architecture and social forms and uses, and business built upon these features when it became the driving force behind the Internet's rapid expansion in the 1990s. Castells examines the new economy in some detail, looking at the relationship between the Internet and capital markets, changes in employment practices, and networking as a management tool. With a new economy based on the culture of innovation, risk, and expectations, Castells sees the emergence of a new kind of business cycle characterized by volatile, information-driven financial markets. Turning to the impact of the Internet on social relationships, he notes a new pattern of sociability, networked individualism, in which individuals build their networks on- and offline on the basis of values, interests, and projects. Castells observes that while the Internet has the potential to strengthen democracy through broadening the sources of information and enabling greater citizenship participation, it has at the same time contributed greatly to the politics of scandal. He also looks at unresolved issues of privacy and security, describing the Internet as contested terrain, where the new, fundamental battle for freedom in the Information Age is being fought. In his sobering final chapter, the author studies the divide between peoples and regions that operate in the digital world and those that cannot. Absorbing history-but, with the jargon of academic sociology, an arduous read. (Kirkus Reviews)

Attempting an academic survey of the internet is an heroic task ... Manuel Castells is better placed than most to attempt such an undertaking, and pulls it off with verve and clarity. RSA Journal Authoritative guide to the origins of the internet, how it is affecting every area of human life, and its business applications. Sunday Times Books of the Year 2001 This small but complete volume is a critical introduction to internet-related theories, while doubling as a simplified reader on his own ideas. The book should help to spread his influence beyond the faithful. Prospect The Internet Galaxy is the best attempt by a big thinker to grapple with the net's long-term implications for our society. Mark Leonard, New Statesman The Internet is shaping society and in turn being shaped by society. It takes a scholar of Manuel Castells's range to do justice to this phenomenon. His book is learned without being pompous, and insightful without being impenetrable. If we ever get a discipline of Internet studies, this will be one of its founding texts. John Naughton, author of A Brief History of the Future: The Origins of the Internet Manuel Castells has proved once again that he has an unmatched synoptic capacity to make sense of the complexities of a networked world, and here writes with clarity and insight about everything from the history of the technology to the subcultures that have done so much to shape it. Geoff Mulgan, author of Communications and Control and Connexity Director of the Performance and Innovation Unit, The Cabinet Office and head of the Prime Minister's Forward Strategy Unit Thoroughly researched and truly global in scope. Castells provides balanced covergae of e-business and the new economy: the politics of the Internet, including privacy and freedom: and the geography of the Internet. Highly recommended for academic libraries. Library Journal [An] excellent, readable, nontechnical summary of the history, social implications and likely future of Internet business. Publishers Weekly Castells is probably the world's most highly regarded commentator on the information age and new economic order. Management Today: Guru Guide Adam Smith explained how capitalism worked, and Karl Marx explained why it didn't. Now the social and economic relations of the Information Age have been captured by Manuel Castells. The Wall Street Journal A readable, articulate and persuasive account of why the internet's most powerful impacts on the shape of business, politics and society may be yet to come. Castells is the nearest thing the internet has to a founding philosopher. Charles Leadbetter - Financial Times

Author Information

Manuel Castells, born in Spain in 1942, is Professor of Planning and Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Berkeley where he was appointed in 1979. Previously he taught for twelve years at the University of Paris. He has also been a visiting professor in fifteen universities in Europe, North America, Asia, and Latin America. He has published twenty-one books, including the trilogy The Information Age: Economy, Society, and Culture (1996-2000), translated into fourteen languages. He has been a member of the European Commission's Expert Group on the Information Society, of the Advisory Committee to the United Nations Secretary General on Information and Communication Technology, and of the Advisory Committee to the President of South Africa on Information Technology and Development. He is a member of the European Academy.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available