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Informationalism and the network society 37activities, and the content and geometry of the flows of information thatperform the activities in terms of function and meaning. This is the space offlows.Time, in social terms, used to be defined as the sequencing of practices.Biological time, characteristic of most of human existence (and still the lot ofmost people in the world) is defined by the sequence programmed in the lifecycles of nature. Biological time was shaped throughout history by what I callbureaucratic time; that is, the organization of time, in institutions and in everydaylife, by the codes of military-ideological apparatuses, working on therhythms of biological time. In the industrial age, clock time graduallyemerged; that is, the measure and organization of sequencing with enoughprecision to assign tasks and order to every moment of life, starting with standardizedindustrial work and the calculation of the time horizon of financialtransactions, two fundamental components of industrial capitalism that couldnot work without clock time. In the network society, the emphasis on sequencingis reversed. The relationship to time is defined by the use of informationand communication technologies in a relentless effort to annihilate time bynegating sequencing. This is done, on the one hand, by compressing time (asin split-second global financial transactions or the effort to fight “instantwars”), and, on the other, by blurring the sequence of social practices, includingpast, present, and future, in a random order, as in the electronic hypertext,or in the blurring of life-cycle patterns, both in work and in parenting.In industrial society, organized around the idea of progress and the developmentof productive forces, becoming structured being, time conformed tospace. In the network society, the space of flows dissolves time by disorderingthe sequence of events and making them simultaneous, thus installing societyin structural ephemerality: being cancels becoming.The construction of space and time is socially differentiated. The multiplespace of places, fragmented and disconnected, displays diverse temporalities,from the most traditional domination of biological rhythms to the control ofclock time. Selected functions and individuals transcend time, while devaluedactivities and subordinate people endure life as time goes by. There are,however, alternative projects of structuration of time and space, as an expressionof social movements that aim at modifying the dominant programs of thenetwork society. Thus, instead of accepting timeless time as the time ofautomata, the environmental movement proposes to live time in a longuedurée cosmological perspective, seeing our lives as part of the evolution of ourspecies, and feeling solidarity with future generations, and with our cosmologicalbelonging. This is what Lash and Urry (1994) conceptualized as glacialtime.Communities around the world also fight to preserve the meaning of locality,and to assert the space of places, based on experience, over the logic of the
38 Manuel Castellsspace of flows, based on instrumentality, in the process that I label as the“grassrooting” of the space of flows. Indeed, the space of flows does not disappear,since it is the spatial form of the network society, but its logic can betransformed. Instead of enclosing meaning and function in the programs of thenetworks, it could provide material support for the global connection of localexperience.Space and time are redefined at the same time by the emergence of a newsocial structure and by the struggles over the shape and programs of this socialstructure. In a sense, space and time express the culture(s) of the network society.Culture in the Network SocietyAll societies are cultural constructs, if we understand culture as the set ofvalues and beliefs that inform and motivate people’s behavior. So, if there is aspecific network society, we should be able to identify the culture of thenetwork society as its historical marker. Here again, however, the complexityand novelty of the network society suggest caution. First of all, because thenetwork society is global, it works with and integrates a multiplicity ofcultures, linked to the history and geography of each area of the world. In fact,industrialism, and the culture of the industrial society, did not make culturesdisappear around the world. The industrial society had many different, andindeed contradictory, manifestations (from the United States to the SovietUnion, and from Japan to the United Kingdom). There were also industrializedcores in otherwise largely rural and traditional societies. Not even capitalismunified its realm of historical existence culturally. Yes, the market ruled inevery capitalist country, but under such specific rules, and with such a varietyof cultural forms, that identifying a culture as capitalist is of little analyticalhelp, unless we actually mean by that American or Western culture: it thenbecomes empirically wrong.So, in the same way, the network society develops in a multiplicity ofcultural settings, produced by the differential history of each context. It materializesin specific forms, leading to the formation of highly diverse institutionalsystems, as the studies presented in this volume demonstrate. There isstill a common core to the network society, as there was to industrial society,but there is an additional layer of unity in the network society. It exists globallyin real time. It is global in its structure. Thus, not only does it deploy itslogic in the whole world, but it keeps its networked organization at the globallevel at the same time as it makes itself specific in every society.This double movement of commonality and singularity has two mainconsequences at the cultural level. On the one hand, specific cultural identitiesbecome the trenches of autonomy, and sometimes of resistance, for collectives
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38 Manuel Castellsspace of flows, based on instrumentality, in the process that I label as the“grassrooting” of the space of flows. Indeed, the space of flows does not disappear,since it is the spatial form of the network society, but its logic can betransformed. Instead of enclosing meaning and function in the programs of thenetworks, it could provide material support for the global connection of localexperience.Space and time are redefined at the same time by the emer<strong>ge</strong>nce of a newsocial structure and by the struggles over the shape and programs of this socialstructure. In a sense, space and time express the culture(s) of the network society.Culture in the Network SocietyAll societies are cultural constructs, if we understand culture as the set ofvalues and beliefs that inform and motivate people’s behavior. So, if there is aspecific network society, we should be able to identify the culture of thenetwork society as its historical marker. Here again, however, the complexityand novelty of the network society sug<strong>ge</strong>st caution. First of all, because thenetwork society is global, it works with and integrates a multiplicity ofcultures, linked to the history and <strong>ge</strong>ography of each area of the world. In fact,industrialism, and the culture of the industrial society, did not make culturesdisappear around the world. The industrial society had many different, andindeed contradictory, manifestations (from the United States to the SovietUnion, and from Japan to the United Kingdom). There were also industrializedcores in otherwise lar<strong>ge</strong>ly rural and traditional societies. Not even capitalismunified its realm of historical existence culturally. Yes, the market ruled inevery capitalist country, but under such specific rules, and with such a varietyof cultural forms, that identifying a culture as capitalist is of little analyticalhelp, unless we actually mean by that American or Western culture: it thenbecomes empirically wrong.So, in the same way, the network society develops in a multiplicity ofcultural settings, produced by the differential history of each context. It materializesin specific forms, leading to the formation of highly diverse institutionalsystems, as the studies presented in this volume demonstrate. There isstill a common core to the network society, as there was to industrial society,but there is an additional layer of unity in the network society. It exists globallyin real time. It is global in its structure. Thus, not only does it deploy itslogic in the whole world, but it keeps its networked organization at the globallevel at the same time as it makes itself specific in every society.This double movement of commonality and singularity has two mainconsequences at the cultural level. On the one hand, specific cultural identitiesbecome the trenches of autonomy, and sometimes of resistance, for collectives