Pleonastic exclusion in the European Information Society

Abstract

The dramatic changes in communication technology and the media this last decade of the century have inspired enthusiasm among business community, policy makers and academic scholars. Visions of prosperity and social wealth have become the core arguments for defending the strong emphasis on the Information Society “project”. Europe is working hard towards research and development but is it taking the right way? A lot can be said about the differences of the communication infrastructure between the rich North and the poor South (Vincent, 1998), but not much attention is paid to the situation in the countries of the Periphery. This paper intents to focus specifically on this area and to take a look at the Greek experience. Greece is an EU member State but at the same time is part of the Periphery standing inbetween the rich industrialised North and the poor developing South. The paper argues that, despite the citizens’ needs and wishes, the promotion of the European Information Society (IS) in Greece is characterised by disproportionality. Another kind of capital difference between groups with different socio-economic status is emerging. The `Knowledge-Gap' phenomenon becomes evident in that a high percentage of the population is excluded as users of the new media, due to reasons related to their educational and financial status. Additionally, a new phenomenon of “pleonastic exclusion” is taking place, as a result of the enormous numbers of channels of communication, which forces audiences to a continuous selection-exclusion of information sources. The paper investigates the consequences of the IS as it is currently planned departing from data of a local level, exploring the Greek experience, and relating them to issues of global significance such as the emergence of new classes.