From 1983, Irving Louis Horowitz: The relationship between political democracy and the new technology is by no means either uniform or mechanistic. In rapidly developing areas, nationalism may conflict with a wide use of a technology that has foreign or colonial origins. Antidemocratic constraints come masked in hostility to foreign ideas, influences, artifacts, and scientific systems. The intense desire for national autonomy not infrequently spills over into tightly knit controls over the new information technology. [...] Controls on information flow can be justified on the basis of national security, privacy, economics, or nationalism. The restrictions, however, are often a two-edged sword: they may protect the country in one way and injure it in another." In other words, the need for socioeconomic development involves maximum participation in the international exchange of information and ideas, even as the need to protect national interests may seek elites to limit such maximal use.
Printed Words, Computers, and Democratic Societies |
