The Sociology Book

154

organizing social relations, because
they are far better at managing
complexity. As well as the
economic networks of financial
trade and capital investment,
microelectronic networks include
political and interpersonal
networks. The “network state”
includes transnational political
bodies such as the European Union,
while examples of interpersonal
networks are enacted through
the Internet, email, and social
networking websites such as
Facebook and Twitter.
Castells says a network can
be defined as follows: it has no
“center”; it is made up of a series
of “nodes” of varying importance
but nevertheless all are necessary
in order for the network to operate;
the degree of social power peculiar
to a network is relative depending
on how much information it is able
to process; a network only deals
with a certain type of information—
namely, the type of information
relevant to it; and a network is an
open structure, able to expand and
compress without limits.
Castells emphasizes the high
levels of adaptability characteristic
of network society. Key here is that

a social order organized into and

around networks can lay claim to

being highly dynamic, innovative,

and geared to ongoing, fast-moving

social changes. Castells describes

networked social relations as a

“dynamic, self-expanding form

of human activity” that tends

to transform all spheres of social

and economic life.

Social dynamics

The matter of whether individuals

and institutions participate in, or

are excluded from, certain social

networks provides Castells with

a window on the power dynamics

at work in the network society. He

concludes that networked relations

have changed the structure of

society over time.

Castells’ initial argument was

that individuals working within

large multinational finance houses

and institutions, and whose

professional work is structured

within and through networks of

global financial flows, comprised

the dominant social group—what

he calls the “technocratic-financial-

managerial elite.” Occupying the

key posts of command and control

within the worldwide system,

MANUEL CASTELLS

The network society is a
result of affordable, globally
unifying telecommunications
technology that has changed
how we live, think, and do
things. People who may never
meet one another can now
communicate instantly to
trade goods or to exchange
information and ideas.

this elite’s preferred spatiality

is the global city—from here it is

able to reproduce its cosmopolitan

practices and interests.

Meanwhile, in contrast, the

lives of the masses tend to be local

rather than global—organized

around and clustered in places

where people live in close physical

proximity and social relations are

characterized by shared ways of

life. Therefore, said Castells, most

people build meaningful identities

and lives in actual geographically

specific locales, the “space of

places,” rather than in the ethereal

and placeless world of electronic

networks, the “space of flows.”

With the spread of the Internet

and social media, however, this

view of a unified, cosmopolitan,

global elite using the space of flows

to exert power came to be seen

as overly simplistic. Economically

impoverished social groups may

find it harder to incorporate into,

and center their lifestyles on,

Internet-based technologies to the

same degree as socially dominant

groups, but this is less and less

the case. Castells now claims that

“people of all kinds, wishing to do

all kinds of things, can occupy this

space of flows and use it for their

own purposes.”

Networks have become the

predominant organizational

form of every domain of

human activity.

Manuel Castells

Financial

data

Chat

rooms

Entertainment

services

Online

shopping