Customer Reviews

The Internet Galaxy: Reflections on the Internet, Business, and Society (Clarendon Lectures in Management Studies)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(11)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

It is part of the conventional wisdom that the Internet affects all of our lives, is a key element in development of the 'new economy', and is becoming a major factor in political development. At the same time, how the Internet interacts with other influences and what social and technological trends are going on under the surface is not well understood. It is, however, so central to the development of our economy and society that it is essential to understand it.

Manuel Castells has produced a brilliant analysis of these issues. The book is written for both an academic and a general readership and meets the needs of both excellently, although some parts of it are reasonably hard work for the generalist. The reward, at least for this reader, is a far clearer understanding of the dynamics of development of our networked society and the issues that need to be confronted. It is essential reading for anyone concerned with economic or political development at any level from local community to global issues.

In style the book belongs to what I think of as the European tradition of clear and careful analysis and exposition, rather than the common American approach to business books of heavy reliance on drawing conclusions from examples derived from 'great name' companies. The result is a book that requires serious concentration in order to follow the complex, sometimes contradictory and paradoxical influences that the author elucidates for us.

It is directed primarily to the reader as citizen, rather than specifically aiming to help business people toward profitable application of Internet technology. In consequence, as well as providing a valuable overview of the dynamics of development of our national and global economy and society, it contains useful reflections on ethics and governance at the business level and also on the potential benefits and risks to the development of civil society nationally and internationally.

The author's starting point is that (the dot points following are slightly modified quotations excerpted from the 'Opening' to the book):
* The technology of the Internet provides the means of bringing together reliance on networks, dominant in private interaction, with the capacity for coordination of tasks and management of complexity, for which organizations have historically relied on hierarchical command and control.
* The logic, language and constraints of the Internet are not well understood beyond technological matters. Popular understanding is driven by myth, ideology and gossip more than by a realistic assessment of the issues.
* People, institutions, companies and society at large, transform technology by modifying and experimenting with it. The Internet transforms the way we communicate and do things and, by doing many things with the Internet, we transform the Internet itself.
* It follows that the Internet is a particularly malleable technology, susceptible of being deeply modified by its social practice, and leading to a whole range of potential social outcomes - to be discovered by experience, not proclaimed beforehand. Neither utopia nor dystopia, the Internet is the expression of ourselves - through a specific code of communication, which we must understand if we want to change our reality.

The first two chapters offer lessons from the history of the Internet and a description of the culture that gave rise to, and sustains it. Chapters 3 through 6 discuss e-business, the new economy, the concepts of virtual communities and networked society and key political issues of civil society, privacy and liberty. Chapter 7 is concerned with multimedia, while Chapters 8 and 9 are concerned with the geography of the Internet and the digital divide. There is an 8 page conclusion on the challenges of the network society, in which the mask of the analyst slips somewhat to reveal the passionate advocate of what Soros in The Crisis of Global Capitalism called the open society and to echo Laszlo's call in Macroshift for a 'fundamental revolution of consciousness'. Castells argues:

"Until we rebuild, both from the bottom up and from the top down, our institutions of governance and democracy, we will not be able to stand up to the fundamental challenges we are facing. And if democratic, political institutions cannot do it, no one else will or can."

(This review has been submitted on behalf of Erkki Liikanen, European Commissioner for Enterprise and Information Society)

Manuel Castells new book presents a compelling analysis of the influence of the Internet, considering topics as diverse as individual communication and freedoms, the new dynamics of social movements, business networks in the new economy, and geographic development patterns such as metropolization and digital divide.

The attraction of this book is in several aspects.

Firstly, it references up-to-date research data, making the arguments presented highly credible. For example, he gives a well considered assessment of the role of the Internet for social communication and community-building.

Secondly, Castells addresses the network society from a rich set of perspectives, taking into account both social and economic theory.

Thirdly, he presents a balanced view with respect to the impact of the Internet, observing at times profound and even transformational changes such as in business networks, while being more reserved about its influence in other cases, for example on politics.

The book is rich in well-founded observations and reasoning, while at the same time staying away from speculation or hype. Even if some may contest Castells' interpretations at times, they are always food for thought. They invite to apply the thinking on related phenomena of the network society such as the development of the wireless society or the impact of broadband.

For anyone interested in the policy in the network society I can highly recommend this book.

Erkki Liikanen

Manuel Castells is, with no doubt, the leading figure in the sociology of information. That field has been the fastest rising area in the sociology. It deals with the interaction between IT, the economy, and society.
Manuel Castells secured his position with the book, ¡®The Information City¡Ż (1989). This book grounded the theoretical framework. His three volumes of ¡®Information Age¡Ż have been widely used as the textbook in the class. Those volumes have the rich depth and are well written, conclusive on each issue. But that trilogy is voluminous: about 1500 pages in total. If you prefer short but graphic, succinct introduction to the sociology of information, this is your pick. This book is based on the author¡Żs lecture held at Oxford Business School. So it¡Żs not conceived to be the systematic work but intended to orient the reader toward the basics of the field. He uses various live cases to illustrate the interaction between Internet, the economy, and society. The areas covered range from culture, new economy, virtual community, social movement, privacy, multimedia, and digital divide. Those are almost all topics tackled in the field. But this is not intended to set up serious theoretical basis in the field. If you are interested in such an attempt, I recommend James Slevin¡Żs ¡®The Internet and Society¡Ż. But, as I mentioned in the review on that book, it requires the reader some basic understanding Giddens and other social theories, to get the nub of the book.

Castells' book "The Internet Galaxy" is a book that is good but not great. The book starts out with a really good explanation of the history of the Internet and the different cultures that are involved with the Internet. After this though there are a few interesting things in the middle chapters, but the end of the book is pretty lame. The end of the book is pretty lame because it has a lot of commonsense statements and statistics that are not very interesting.

I found this book to be very informative for those that don't know much about the internet, but for those with knowledge about the internet i would not suggest this books. Castell makes some very good points, but they are over shadowed by how repetitive his writing style is. The best chapter in this book is on e-business, he very hit a homerun with this chapter. Although for the most part this book didn't teach me much that i did not already know about the internet. The last three chapter of this book could have easily been left out to save readers for repetitive writing. Overall, I feel this book is appropriate for new users of the internet, but for those that have a working knowledge of the internet I would not suggest this book.

I feel that Dr. Castells' book had good information at times, but most of the time seemed repetitive and contradicting. In the beginning of the book Dr. Castell did a good job of describing the internet and where it came from. He also told the difference between hackers and crackers and other computer terms. He did contradict himself it seemed later in the book by talking about hackers and crackers. Toward the end of the book it became repetitive as well as common sense information. It seemed that Dr. Castell ran out of items to say so needed to talk about something to fill the pages. Overall, I feel this book was not a good learning tool for the internet.

After reading The Internet Galaxy by Manuel Castells, I can honestly say that I have not learned as much as I would have hoped. Castells does a great job of outlining how the Internet came to be. In addition, he makes controversial statements that have the ability to facilitate discussions/debates. However, there is a lot of unnecessary information in the book. He gives many statistics and thoughts that are pretty much common sense for anyone with any computer savvy. Finally, he fails to discuss the issue of technology in education, which is a very important issue to many in this class. Overall, I think it would be a good book to read for someone who did not have any previous knowledge of what the Internet entailed. However, for those readers with any Internet experience, it is hard to get through all of the useless statistics to get to the heart of Internet issues.

Manuel Castells' book "The Internet Galaxy" provides and interesting perspective and background on the emerging technologies and social evolution of the internet. Castells often reinforces the categorizations and general perspectives of various cultures breaded by the net. The way the cultures were described perhaps would have been more meaningful to a person studying psychology or sociology. Regardless, Castells did lay an interesting foundation for the creation of today's internet. Throughout the book Castells makes interesting presumptions about the future, particularly those based on increasing gap between the haves and have-nots. I often found myself lost in difficult to read, but none the less amusing theories which encouraged me to views a different perspective. The book encouraged me to forget that the internet isn't yet the lifeblood of modern civilization or economic prosperity. I still believe the internet is just past the sages of the model T. The net is quickly becoming a tool, like a car, to many individuals, but isn't yet a necessity to society as a whole. Like people without cars, people without the net will still prosper with their natural, noncomputer based, abilities and talents, even though they may have to walk to work. The internet is a revolution moving at megabytes per second, but is changing the entire global environment with a mere 28 k modem. Castells' book isn't a light read, but what you can make it tough it is very interesting.

I find this book relatively interesting. Especially the development of the internet and it's attributes as a whole. It is almost amazing how the internet evolved from a network connecting different research universities to the massive, complex information super-highway it is today. Looking back at the decisions that the large corporations made to not take part in the initial launch of the internet, they almost seem insane.

Overall, I feel that the book was an average book. It was full of very valuable information. However, it was very difficult to read and at times it was very difficult to keep my interest in the book.

This book contains various points of view of the Cyber Technology. As this, it makes the book too broaden for the readers. Some chapters do not have need of in depth technological or political knowledge, but some do; therefore, the book could be boring for some techies or politicos to read. On the other hand, it could be somewhat exhausting for some front-ended readers.

Personally, I am not quite motivated to read a book that an author tries to often connect or refer historical information with the present or current information. Absolutely, this book is considerably like that.

However, some chapters, such as the Digital Divide most hit my interest for the reason that it is related to a situation about Thailand trying to spread out the use of the Internet to the residents. Furthermore, the digital divide can measure how well the infrastructure of a country is.

Summarily, the book is fairly knowledgeable and it should be more clearly segmented as a leisure book, a text book, a critique of the situation, or a research book.