A Normative Theory of the Information Society
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Taylor & Francis Ltd
Published:28th Nov '11
Currently unavailable, and unfortunately no date known when it will be back
This hardback is available in another edition too:
- Paperback£53.99(9780415719636)
There is a clear need for a systematic, integrative, and rigorous normative theory of the information society. In this book, Duff offers a prescriptive theory to help to guide the academic and policy communities as they debate the future shape of emerging post-industrial, information-based societies. He argues that information policy needs to become anchored in a left-liberal philosophy which foregrounds a feasible permutation of the core ideals of freedom, equality and brotherhood. The information society, if it is to be worth having at all, cannot be allowed to be largely the outcome of the free play of market forces and technological determinism. The social structure, including the information economy, must be subjected to a regulatory axiological system as explicated by some leading proponents of social democracy. This text will be of interest to scholars and students at the cutting edge of information studies, journalism and media, computer science, sociology, politics, philosophy, management and law.
"Duff’s book would be an excellent companion to an undergraduate or introductory graduate course on information technology [and] would be of interest to most social scientists engaged with the topics of information media and technological change." — Contemporary Sociology
"Alastair Duff has written an ambitious, exciting and important book. It is a text that deserves to be widely read…" — Prof. Jan Nolin, Swedish School of Library and Information Sciencer, University of Borås,in Information Research
"This is a fascinating, complex, concise and wideranging exploration of what the author labels the ‘normative crisis of the information society’." — Richard Lance Keeble, University of Lincoln, in Ethical Space
"…a welcome addition on the subject…"— Richard D. Taylor, Pennsylvania State University in Journal of Information Policy
"…as a piece of academic analysis this is a well-sourced and well-argued study which balances an awareness of continuing debates about the information society, with an impatience to develop a normative approach that can be deployed in the real politics of the information age." — Christopher May, Lancaster University, in European Journal of Communication
"...the book is well-structured and makes its case clearly. It represents a strong argument for an ethical and normative theory of the information society. Recent events (e.g. the Leveson Inquiry into phone hacking, the press and democracy in the UK, and Wikileaks’ and Edwards Snowden’s revelations about state surveillance) show us the importance of the subject which Duff addresses. His is an important contribution— and from a leading scholar of the information society."— Hugh Mackay, Ethics and Information Technology
ISBN: 9780415955713
Dimensions: unknown
Weight: 470g
158 pages