Cyberspace and the public sphere: Exploring the democratic potential of the net

Convergence

Volumn 4, Issue 1, 1998, Pages 70-84

  Dahlberg, Lincoln ^a  

^a MASSEY UNIVERSITY   (New Zealand)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0346797405     PISSN: 13548565     EISSN: 17487382     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/135485659800400108     Document Type: Article

References (48)

1. For a selection of more well-known net enthusiasts who articulate technological utopian rhetorics with regard to the net and democracy, see J. Barlow, 'A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace' (1996), 〈http://www.eff.org/pub/Publications/John_Perry_Barlow/barlow_0296. declaration〉 (visited 20 January 1998) ;
2. E. Dyson, G. Gilder, G. Keyworth and A. Toffler, 'Cyberspace and the American Dream: A Magna Carta for the Knowledge Age', The Progress and Freedom Foundation 1995, 〈http://www.pff.org/pff/position.html〉 (20 January 1998);
3. H. Frederick, 'Computer Networks and Emergence of Global Civil Society', in Global Networks: Computers and international Communications, ed. L. Harasim (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1993);
4. B. Gates, The Road Ahead (New York: Viking Penguin, 1995);
5. A. Gore, 'The Global Information Infrastructure: Forging a new Athenian Age of Democracy', Intermedia, 22, no. 2 (1994), pp. 4-7;
6. L. Grossman, The Electronic Republic: Reshaping Democracy in the Information Age (New York: Viking, Penguin, 1995);
7. H. Rheingold, The Virtual Community, Homesteading on the Electronic Frontier (Reading, Mass: Addison Wesley, 1993);
8. A. Toffler and H. Toffler, Creating a New Civilization: The Politics of the Third Wave (Atlanta: Turner Publishing, 1994).
9. J. Habermas, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1989).
10. Cyberspace is a virtual place populated by tracks of digital information left behind by very real human-human and human-machine interaction. For a classic exploration of the concept along these lines, see M. Benedikt (ed), Cyberspace: First Steps (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1991).
11. See, for instance, P. Dahlgren, 'Introduction' in Communication and Citizenship: Journalism and the Public Sphere, eds. P. Dahlgren and C. Sparks (London: Routledge, 1991);
12. J. Curran, 'Mass Media and Democracy: A Reappraisal' in Mass Media and Society, eds. J. Curran and M. Gurevitch (London: Edward Arnold, 1991).
13. See J. Flax, 'Is Enlightenment Emancipatory?: A Feminist Reading of "What is Enlightenment?"' in Postmodernism and the Re-reading of Modernity, eds. F. Barker, P. Hulme and M. Iversen (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1992);
14. I. Young, 'Impartiality and the Civic Public' in Feminism as Critique, eds. S. Benhabib and D. Cornell (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1987).
15. Despite their critiques, these theorists generally agree that some notion of the public sphere remains useful and even necessary. I continue to employ it despite suggestions, by the likes of Poster, that such 'modernist' concepts must be abandoned when assessing 'postmodern phenomena' (M. Poster, 'CyberDemocracy: Internet and the Public Sphere' 〈http://www.hnet.uci.edu/ mposter/writings/democ.html〉, 1995 [20 January 1998]). Whether computer networks, or any other social phenomena for that matter, can be said to be postmodern is still under debate. And, as Poster himself admits, there is no adequate postmodern theory with which to analyse the political role of cyberspace. A more appropriate set of concepts and vocabulary may develop with time, but at present we can only work with the conceptual apparatuses available. In this case, the public sphere concept proves useful. However, social concepts develop out of dynamic material conditions and should be open to historical and cultural revision. In this paper the public sphere concept is modified to take into account some of the important criticisms that have emerged in recent academic debate.
16. P. Varley, 'Electronic Democracy', Technology Review, Nov-Dec 1991, pp. 42-51.
17. See the APC homepage at 〈http://www.apc.org/index. html#contents〉 (20 January 1998).
18. and J. Young, 'Global Network: Computers in a Sustainable Society', WorldWatch Paper, 15 (1993), p. 25.
19. For examples of work that attempts to do this, see P. Golding, 'World Wide Wedge: Division and Contradiction in the Global Information Infrastructure', Monthly Review, 48, no. 3 (1996), pp. 70-85;
20. R. McChesney, 'The Internet and US Communication Policy-Making in Historical and Critical Perspective', Journal of Communication, 46, no. 1 (1996), pp. 98-124;
21. H. Schiller, 'The Global Information Highway: Project for an Ungovernable World' in Resisting the Virtual Life: The Culture and Politics of Information, eds. J. Brook and I. Boal (San Francisco: City Lights, 1 995);
22. and J. Stallabrass, 'Empowering Technology: The Exploration of Cyberspace', New Left Review, 211 (1995), pp. 3-32.
23. P. Golding and G. Murdock, 'Culture, Communication and Political Economy' in Mass Media and Society, eds. J. Curran and M. Gurevitch (Edward Arnold: London, 1991).
24. N. Baran, 'Privatization of Telecommunications', Monthly Review, 48, no. 3 (1996), pp. 59-69.
25. N. Yoshiba, 'Programme for the Establishment of a High-Performance Info-Communications Infrastructure in Japan', UNCTAD, Information Technology for Development: ATAS bulletin, 10 (New York and Geneva: United Nations, 1995).
26. M. Dawson, and J. Bellamy, 'Virtual Capitalism: The Political Economy of The Information Highway', Monthly Review, 48, no. 3 (1996), p. 52.
27. G. Wolf, 'Steve Jobs: The Next Insanely Great Thing', Wired, 4.02 (1996), pp. 102-107, 158-161.
28. It is predicted that revenue generated from sales on the internet may have been as much as US$5 billion in 1997. This is predicted to grow to US$220 billion by 2001. See S. Ness, 'From Hype to Reality in the Emerging Digital Age', Remarks of FCC Commissioner Susan Ness before Wall Street Journal Technology Summit, New York, USA, 15 October 1997 〈http://www.fcc. gov.Speeches/Ness/spsn721.html〉 (20 January 1998).
29. See 〈http://www.e-democracy.org〉 (20 January 1998) and 〈http://www.democracy.org.uk〉 (20 January 1998).
30. A. Shapiro, 'Street Corners in Cyberspace: Keeping On-Line Speech Free', The Nation, 261, no. 1 (1995), p. 11;
31. J. Newhagen and S. Rafaeli, 'Why Communications Researchers Should Study the Internet: A Dialogue', Journal of Communication, 46, no. 1 (1996), p. 12.
32. J. Thompson, The Media and Modernity: A Social Theory of the Media (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995).
33. W. Dutton, 'Network Rules of Order: Regulating Speech in Public Electronic Fora', Media Culture and Society, 18, no. 2 (1996), pp. 269-290.
34. K. Heitman, 'Finding a Voice in Cyberspace', Internet Australasia, 2, no. 1 (1996), pp. 52-53. The rhetoric of non-identity, that both Habermas and net enthusiasts draw upon somewhat, links to a masculine, bourgeois ideology of self-abstraction (the unmarked, yet dominant, subject of cyberspace being the bourgeois male). It masks the very real inequalities participants bring into their cyber-interactions via their identities. Despite the degree of identity 'play' allowed in cyberspace, participants are still confronted with a space where identity is constantly drawn upon as a fixed material reality: a space that is gendered, racialised, and culturally marked.
35. A. Calabrese and M. Borchert, 'Prospects for Electronic Democracy in the United States: Rethinking Communication and Social Policy, Media, Culture and Society, 18, no. 2 (1996), pp. 252-253.
36. T. Roszak, The Cult of Information. A Neo-Luddite Treatise on High-Tech, Artificial Intelligence and the True Art of Thinking (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), p. 171. During 1997 internet service provider Xtra, a business unit of Telecom New Zealand, employed broadcast media to vigorously market the internet as an adult 'dating' medium. Ironically, their campaign also used television advertising to promote the internet as a positive alternative to television for children's education.
37. M. Slouka, War of the Worlds: Cyberspace and the High-Tech Assault on Reality (New York: Basic Books, 1995);
38. C. Stoll, Silicon Snake Oil: Second Thoughts on the Information Highway (New York: Doubleday, 1995).
39. K. Brants, M. Huizengam, and R. van Meerten, 'The New Canals of Amsterdam: An Exercise in Local Electronic Democracy', Media, Culture and Society, 18, no. 2 (1996), pp. 237.
40. K. Hacker, 'Missing Links in the Evolution of Electronic Democratization', Media, Culture and Society, 18, no. 2 (1996), pp. 213-232.
41. Some net enthusiasts are actually encouraging this privatisation of interaction by advocating direct electronic democracy. Rather than looking to enhance the public sphere within representative democratic systems, they argue, reminiscent of Masuda (Y. Masuda, The Information Society as Postindustrial Society [Bethesda MD: World Futures Society, 1981]), that individuals can run government directly by voting through telecommunications networks from their homes.
42. With new communications technologies however, the rhetoric of direct electronic democracy continues to experience much support, particularly in the USA. This can be observed across the political spectrum, from conservatives, represented by Ross Perot and Newt Gingrich (L. Friedland, 'Electronic Democracy and the New Citizenship', Media Culture and Society, 18, no. 2 [1996], pp. 187) to techno-anarchists (see 〈http://www.geocities.com.CapitolHill/8778/ 〉 [20 January 1998]).
43. These objectives are still in draft form, without a specified timetable for delivery. They include 'all school students IT literate, IT courses available to all, access to the "information superhighway" for all, and protection of individual rights in the information age'. See the IT Advisory Group Communications Framework at 〈http://www.netlink.co.nz/itag/itagob. htm〉 (20 January 1998).
44. See Wellington Info City plan at 〈http://www.wcc.govt.nz/wcc/ infocity/〉 (20 January 1998).
45. R. Moore, 'Democracy and Cyberspace', paper presented at international conference, Discourse and Decision Making in the Information Age, University of Teesside, UK, 18 September 1997.
46. M. Surman, 'The Electronic Commons: Public Space and Canada's Information Highway' (1995), 〈http://kows.web.net/policy_page/crtc2.html〉 (visited 20 January 1998).
47. G. Mulgan, Communication and Control (Cambridge: Polity, 1991), p. 261.
48. I. Rappaport, 'Democracy in the Information Society: A proposal to Government', personal communication with the author, 3 September 1997.