International Cultural Studies
Etudes culturelles internationales
Sektion IV:Section IV:Section IV:|
|
Internationale
Kulturwissenschaften International Cultural Studies Etudes culturelles internationales |
|
|
|
||
|
Sektion IV: |
Kulturwissenschaften und neue Informationsprozesse | |
|
Section IV: |
Cultural Studies and New Information Processes | |
|
Section IV: |
Etudes culturelles et nouvelles formes d’information | |
| Mathias Ottitsch / Erik Bohlin / Alois Frotschnig (*) (Sevilla) |
Introduction
The motivation for this paper is derived from the three elements, which are: Sustainability, Information Society and Culture/Science Interests. It is the aim to highlight the intellectual linkages and bridges between the three elements through a mixture of broad and more focussed perspectives on the respective elements.
Sustainable development (SD) has meanwhile widely transcended pure environmentalism and emphasizes nowadays a dynamic view for the development of more opportunities for future generations and taking thereby into account social and geopolitical concerns as well as cultural aspects. Seen in this way it is evident that Information Society (IS) being instrumental to growth and well-being in the 21st century anyway, will therefore have a crucial impact on sustainable development. Moreover the information society technologies constitute a bond but also an opportunity for Cultures and Cultural Systems involved. From the point of view of Cultural Actors a completely new and challenging landscape emerges comprising considerable threats but also big opportunities.
The European Commission is aware about the link between IS and SD (1)(2)(3). To that end, the ACTS program of the European Commission has funded the project ASIS (Alliance for a Strategic Information Society: (4)). ASIS has the objective of providing convincing evidence of the ways in which ICT can make a positive contribution to sustainability, and to suggest the most fruitful areas of action (5).
Scenario work
"Scenario planning depends on striking a good balance between the known and the novel" (6). It can also be put: meaningful scenario work is done with a balanced mixture of academic analysis, decision-maker involvement, and creativity. Such a participatory policy analysis has "the ultimate goal to improve the problem solving capacity of the individual stakeholder and the policy network as a whole" (7). Since this work targets, on the one hand academia and on the other hand decision-makers from politics and industry, the emphasis in these ASIS scenarios is put on creativity in order to keep the balance (8).
The scenario technique therefor offers the possibility of a structured, qualitative approach of understanding possible future developments. To find a way through the jungle of issues and data a structured assessment of issues is done in the categories of axis of dichotomy. Axes of dichotomy are by definition coordinates that allow us to separate future endstates. Having derived the right axis of dichotomy assures us that the future endstates are overlapping to a minimal extent (9).
ASIS Scenarios
ASIS is exploring scenarios describing possible future developments in the area of ICT/IS/SD from a variety of perspectives. From the methodological point of view, varied approaches have been taken. One approach is quantitative and includes modeling using a variety of tools. A further approach is more qualitative, considering more the issue of understanding what ICT driven sustainable development will actually mean for everyday life. Not only this but a variety of key areas forms psychological and microsociological aspects, to geopolitics in a world in which ICT drives the evolution of society is considered.
Axes of dichotomy
By understanding then better the space spanned up, in which the scenarios are situated the possible axis of dichotomy are reduced to the way technology is applied and to the sort of human's mind set.
1. Technology use
We distinguish two possible ways technology can be used throughout society:
2. Mind set
The manner the personality of future inhabitants is structured according to their perception of the relation two each other.
These lead us then to four distinct scenarios (Figure 1) (10):
Figure 1: ASIS scenarios
Structure
The scenarios are structured in form of a series of news-clips, going backward in time. In this way the reader is catapulted into the future, triggering a similar mindset as is portrayed by the story. By going backwards in time along the text, the distance between the described future and the actual reality is bridged. The scenarios are constructed with the same topical line, in order to provide intercomparability between them (The scenarios are thereby structured in a way that they take in a certain point of time, a snapshot out of one of the policy fields found relevant to the scenarios. The sequence of events form then a plot consisting of a series of crucial changes or bifurcation points forging the trajectory of development in the different lines of the scenarios. All of the policy fields in the plot are only taken into account explicitly when they are relevant for driving the trajectories into a certain direction.
When we consider the policy field of culture or science and how they develop along the trajectories of the scenarios we are facing a totally different task. We are forced not to consider in which point of time, culture or science are going to become unique and crucial drivers influencing the outcome of bifurcation points in future scenario trajectories (Figure 2). On the contrary we have to understand the development of culture and science itself and how they are shaped along the scenario trajectories. Our objective then is to understand the influence of bifurcation points on culture and science respectively the interaction of culture and science with the crucial drivers of change (Table 1):
Table 1
| Time | Area of issue | Ecocyber | Cyberpolis | Break free |
Boring Disease |
| 2020 | Final State | A New Life Style: Eco-Cyber | A Controlled Society | Mosaic Living | New President Elected |
| 2015 | Geopolitics | Europe No Longer a Fortress | Europe in Charge | Proxi citizens | Unrest among Immigrants |
| 2012 | Environment | Green Consumer Power Changes European Markets |
Ecology - no problem! Everything under control! |
Global action groups | Second Kyoto Summit: Same Old Blues Again? |
| 2008 | Governance | New Ways in Governing Society | Eco authoritarian governance | Mosaic Governance | Market Forces Rule Supreme |
| 2005 | ICT | New Citizens: Cybizens | One European Network | Self organised ICT | Telecoms Dominated by Elites |
| 2002 | Education | Reform of the Educational System | Streamlined knowledge collectivism | Skills not knowledge | No School no More |
 |
 |
The scenarios are thereby structured in a way that they take in a certain point of time, a snapshot out of one of the policy fields found relevant to the scenarios. The sequence of events form then a plot consisting of a series of crucial changes or bifurcation points forging the trajectory of development in the different lines of the scenarios. All of the policy fields in the plot are only taken into account explicitly when they are relevant for driving the trajectories into a certain direction.
When we consider the policy field of culture or science and how they develop along the trajectories of the scenarios we are facing a totally different task. We are forced not to consider in which point of time, culture or science are going to become unique and crucial drivers influencing the outcome of bifurcation points in future scenario trajectories (Figure 2). On the contrary we have to understand the development of culture and science itself and how they are shaped along the scenario trajectories. Our objective then is to understand the influence of bifurcation points on culture and science respectively the interaction of culture and science with the crucial drivers of change.
Figure 2
Especially when we consider the plot representing culture and science in the future it is the question if their development can be found within the finite boundaries of the scenario trajectories. It can be, as well that certain cultural or scientific developments will themselves be the basis for bifurcation between one and the other possibility of future development (Figure 3).
When we see the series of events driving future developments step by step continuously more and more into the direction of even more distinct scenario types, the possibililty for culture and science to influence the switching from one trajectory to another will be increasingly unlikely. Actors, both in culture as well as in science will face a bigger and bigger threshold, due to the distance put already between the different trajectories.
Therefor it is not only useful but also necessary to investigate on the current features of culture and science that have in this grid of scenario work the ability and the potential of taking an influence on upcoming bifurcations of the scenario trajectories.
Culture and Science today: shaping future trajectories
EC: Collaborative authoring
Science and culture are permanently "under construction". Although the most striking events are linked with the names of individuals, exchange of ideas and collaboration in "networks" is indispensable for further development or any breakthrough. The World Wide Web is, nowadays, seen mostly as a ``read-only'' interactive system, while the publishing phase is considered to be, in a sense, off-line: the authors (i.e., designers and producers at once) write their documents and publish them in a stage that is totally separate from the browsing stage. In a way this reflects the asymmetry in scientific publishing and production of literature.
Recently, the approach has been different: several tools are available that include collaborative authoring capabilities (11). The underlying idea is to restore a collaborative read-write symmetry into the WWW: one can create and browse resources using the same tool and, more important, by using the Web itself to perform work collaboratively and simultaneously.
Representing the networked mindset combined with the emancipatory use of technology (Eco cyber scenario) such an environment puts forward creativity and efficiency in the cultural and scientific sphere which must be recognised being unprecedented in history. The participants are able to create their enviromnent and to influence their boundaries in a revolutionary way.
BF: Books on Demand
Free expression of opinion was throughout history strongly linked to the availability of capital funds. Or if we think on, for example, the life and future development of minority cultures, the limited market size hindered economies of scale and made literary work unfeasible. The basic principles of political liberalism were thereby often disabled by the contradictions of reality.
The development of "Books on Demand" is going to help the free expression of opinion regardless to cultural origin, political orientation and financial means. "Books on Demand" are stored virtually in a database (http://www.bod.de). The inscription is about Euro 120, a single paperback costs around Euro 7, independent of the potential market volume. Once ordered it is printed out and sent to the store or directly to the reader.
In the scenario grid we find ourselves clearly on the emancipatory side of the axis of "technology use". The mindset is entrepreneurial. People with the will of taking proactively an influence on society are enabled to do so. Individual social entrepreneurism is thereby facilitated by this feature of the upcoming Information Society.
CP: Cyberspace control
The fact that e-traffic is continuously surveyed and checked on its content is not new to the informed public. If we consider also the fact that companies check and filter on a private basis the emails of their employees it is already becoming even more serious. If we combine these two practices in the hands of government bodies, a completely virtual controlled information society is due to come true.
We find here a classical hint to a combination of an authoritarian use of technology with a networked mindset. The mindset of the players is networked and a network community exists. If there is also the feature of sorting out non-political correct cultural expression an uniformed, networked mind is created. Then one can clearly not speak anymore of individual discrimination but of tough control of an overall networked community.
BD: Industry consortia convince
Grassroots versus establishment in culture is as old as society. New technologies make that struggle obvious and propose changes as well as preservation. In the music scenery digitization and the internet offer new marketing possibilities.
MP3 started out as simply an abbreviation for MPEG Layer 3 - which is an audio compression algorithm. However, it can no longer be regarded simply as an audio compression format, but rather a part of our culture. The popularity of MP3's began to spread when people realized that they could store their favorite songs on their computers and transfer them to friends, and also violating property rights. As a response, it is the collective effort of record labels and technology companies all over the world to develop a specification for digital music. According to official statements, the specification will answer consumer demand for convenient accessibility to quality digital music, enable copyright protection for artists' work, and enable technology and music companies to build successful businesses. Additionally, using control of Internet traffic by excluding non suitable traffic the big players are the frontrunners in that struggle.
In a scenario environment of an entrepreneurial mindset and authoritarian technological use only dominant market players will be able to shape the future and to determine culture. Their authority allows them to impose both obligation and restriction to the market by centralised owned technology, supported by an hierarchical perception of society.
Conclusion
"Scenarios are no predictions or forecasts" (14). "A good scenario does exactly that - it can lead you to ask better questions" (15). Scenarios can never be absolutely exclusive. There will always be some overlap. The discussed case studies can clearly exist in parallel for quite some time in the future. But there will be a dominant one. And the features of the dominant one will dictate the main features of the overall Information Society. The emancipatory effect of books on demand, for example, is disabled in the moment the content is controlled in an authoritarian way or marketing power is the overwhelming means of attracting potential readers' interest.
Each point in time is a potential bifurcation point of future trajectories. A bifurcation point is defined by the impossibility of determining the time paths. But this does not mean at all that to see and to wait is the way of handling the business. On the contrary initiative and the will to shape the future is the crucial asset. And cultural and scientific activists own this asset to a large extent. If this paper gives some kind of basic roadmap for that clientele a synergistic effect can be triggered.
References:
| * | Disclaimer: Opinions expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Commission |
| 1 | Europe at the forefront of the Global Information Society: Rolling Action Plan, Commission Communication COM(96)607, updated 31.06.97. http://www.ispo.cec.be/infosoc/legreg.html |
| 2 | Building the European Information Society for Us All, Final Report, the Commission's High Level Group of Experts on the Social and Societal Aspects of the Information Society, April 1997. http://www.ispo.cec.be/hleg/hleg.html |
| 3 | Europe and the Global Information Society (Bangemann Report): Recommendations for the European Council High-Level Group on the Information Society, 26 May 1994. http://www.ispo.cec.be/infosoc/backg/bangeman.html |
| 4 | Alliance for a Sustainable Information Society (ASIS). A project of the European Commission. http://asis.jrc.es |
| 5 | The IPTS Report: Special issue on the Information Society and Sustainability. Issue 32, 1999, Sevilla. http://www.jrc.es/iptsreport |
| 6 | Van der Heijden Kees: Scenarios: The Art of Strategic Conversation, Wiley, 1996 |
| 7 | Geurts J.L.A., and Mayer I.S.: Methods for Participatory Policy Analysis: Towards a Conceptual Model for Research and Development, Tilbur Univeristy, work and Organization Research Centre (WORC) Report 96.12.008/3, Tilburg, 1996 |
| 8 | Bohlin E., Frotschnig A., and Pestel R.: Editorial: Information Society and Sustainability, The IPTS Report, Issue 32, 1999. http://www.jrc.es/iptsreport/vol32/english/EDI1E326.htm |
| 9 | Frotschnig A., Ottitsch M., and Tochtermann K.: A Strategic Alliance for a Sustainable Information Society, The IPTS Report, Issue 32, 1999. http://www.jrc.es/iptsreport/vol32/english/ISS2E326.htm |
| 10 | Bohlin E., Frotschnig A., Ottitsch M., and Hardy P.: Perspectives on the Information Society and Sustainable Development, In: Conference proceedings of the 4'th International Conference on Networking Entities - The organisational impact of telematics, 18-19 March, 1999, Krems, Austria: http://tim.donau-uni.ac.at/veran/neties.htm#Proceedings |
| 11 | e.g.: http://www.UsabilityFirst.com/cscw.html |
| 12 | E-newsletter: http://archiv.quintessenz.at/archiv/msg00763.html |
| 13 | http://www.pressetext.at/show.pl.cgi?pta=990712017 |
| 14 | Hammond Allen: Which World? Scenarios for the 21st centruy. Global Destinies, Regional Choices. Earthscan Publications, London, 1998. |
| 15 | Schwartz Peter: The Art of the Long View : Planning for the Future in an Uncertain World, Paperback, Doubleday, 1996. |
|
|
Internationale
Kulturwissenschaften International Cultural Studies Etudes culturelles internationales |
|
|
|
||
|
Sektion IV: |
Kulturwissenschaften und neue Informationsprozesse | |
|
Section IV: |
Cultural Studies and New Information Processes | |
|
Section IV: |
Etudes culturelles et nouvelles formes d’information | |
|
|
|
|