Where do you want to go today? The rise of information capital

Abstract

The economic paradigms of the industrial age, on which the socialist analysis of capitalism has depended, are in the process of being replaced by new paradigms of the globalised, information age. Developments in information technology since the 1970s have made possible new forms of economic organisation in both manufacturing and also in the media industries which have undergone substantial changes in the last twenty years. The huge growth in the spread of digital telecommunications over the last ten years has accelerated this process, leading us to the brink of a new era of capitalist development. One aspect of these new forms of economic organisation is the process of globalisation. A world economy has, of course, existed since the beginning of capitalism and came of age in the era of colonialism. Marx spoke in the 1840s of how the bourgeoisie had: given a cosmopolitan character to production and consumption in every country. To the great chagrin of reactionaries, it has drawn from under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood. All old-fashioned national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new industries... whose products are consumed, not only at home, but in every quarter of the globe...In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal interdependence of nations. 1