Abstract
This paper focuses on the potential impacts of the information highways on democracy. It begins by showing with concrete examples that this new technology, like other communication networks, is a tool which allows integration and cohesion to be increased. But the paper stresses that to improve communications does not mean making society more equal and more democratic. The second part of this paper considers how to build up the information highways according to official documents of the European Union. It underlines that the liberalization of the telecommunications sector required by the official texts and the basic importance given to market forces and to competition can be considered a threat to democratic values. There is a serious risk of increasing inequalities. There are also problems linked to services and to content such as issues in financing nonprofit services, threats to the freedom to communicate and to operate on the network, risks of information being limited, and so on.
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d’Udekem-Gevers, M. (1997). Information highways: A threat to democracy?. In: Berleur, J., Whitehouse, D. (eds) An Ethical Global Information Society. IFIP — The International Federation for Information Processing. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-35327-2_23
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-35327-2_23
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