Cyberpower: An Introduction to the Politics of Cyberspace

by Jordan,Tim

• ISBN13: 9780415170772
• ISBN10: 041517077X
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1999-04-16
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

If knowledge is power, then what kind of knowledge leads to cyberpower? Written around a clear and simple theoretical framework,Cyberpowercovers key concepts such as power and cyberspace, the virtual individual, society in cyberspace, and imagination and the internet. Tim Jordan surfs through a wealth of material, including original research in interviews and statistical analysis, to provide a complete analysis of the politics and culture of cyberspace. Drawing on examples from cross-gendered virtual selves to the meaning of Bill Gates, he questions who actually governs cyberspace and what powers the individual can control while there. Using case studies from the rich mythology of the electronic frontier, from cyberrape to total surveillance,Cyberpowershows how cyberspace is remaking global society.

Author Biography

Tim Jordan is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Sociology. University of East London.

Table of Contents

List of illustrations	viii
Acknowledgements	ix
Power and cyberspace	1	(19)
Key concepts	1	(1)
Introduction	1	(1)
Cyberpower	2	(5)
Power	7	(13)
Max Weber: power as a possession	9	(2)
Barry Barnes: power as social order	11	(4)
Michel Foucault: power as domination	15	(5)
Cyberspace and the matrix	20	(39)
Key concepts	20	(1)
Introduction	21	(2)
Cyberspace: the science fiction vision	23	(10)
Cyberspace: the matrix of computers	33	(22)
History of a technology	33	(16)
Size, users and uses	49	(6)
Conclusion	55	(1)
Barlovian cyberspace	55	(4)
The virtual individual	59	(41)
Key concepts	59	(1)
Introduction	60	(5)
Axes of individual cyberpower: identity, hierarchy, information	65	(22)
Identity fluidity	65	(14)
Anti-hierarchical	79	(6)
A world made of information	85	(2)
Cyberpower at the individual	87	(9)
Cyberpower as a possession	88	(1)
Cyberpolitics: access and rights	89	(7)
Conclusion	96	(4)
The virtual social I: the social in cyberspace	100	(42)
Key concepts	100	(1)
Introduction	101	(6)
The social and the individual	107	(3)
Technopower	110	(5)
The spiral of technopower	115	(20)
Information overload	117	(11)
The complete spiral	128	(7)
The technopower elite	135	(7)
The virtual social II: the social between online and offline	142	(37)
Key concepts	142	(1)
Introduction	142	(3)
Cyberspace and production, consumption and politics in information societies	145	(22)
Production	147	(6)
Consumption	153	(9)
Politics	162	(5)
The informational space of flows	167	(4)
Online and offline	171	(8)
The virtual imaginary	179	(29)
Key concepts	179	(1)
Introduction	179	(2)
The collective imagination	181	(4)
Visions of heaven	185	(20)
Cyborgs	187	(3)
Information codes	190	(6)
and hell	196	(5)
Superpanopticon: cyborgs, minutiae and fear of cyberspace	201	(3)
Fear itself	204	(1)
Cyberspace's imaginary	205	(3)
Cyberpower	208	(11)
Key concepts	208	(1)
Introduction	208	(2)
Relations between three types of cyberpower	210	(4)
The first war of cyberspace: elites and grassroots	214	(5)
Notes	219	(10)
Glossary	229	(4)
Bibliography	233	(15)
Index	248