Roadgrading Community Culture: Why the Internet is so Dangerous to Real Democracy

Abstract

And I am not without hope. I knew a man who, in the age of chainsaws, went right on cutting his wood with a handsaw and axe. He was a healthier and a saner man than I am. I shall let his memory trouble my thoughts. 2 WENDELL BERRY ABSTRACT This article forwards an anarchist analysis of the internet as inherently degrading of local community and the possibility of real democracy emerging. The authors suggest that rampant virtuality, based on the eradication of time and space as functional communicative restraints, acts to separate individuals from their face-to-face relationships and localities. They forward that local community is the only forum in which genuine democracy and an ecological society can hope to thrive. The article argues that in asking the question Where do you want to go today?, the internet attempts to create a virtual everywhere, a universalising logic that is to communication what the WTO and globalisation are to economics. Further, the piece forwards a view of technology and society in dialectic relationship with one another, suggesting that democratic tools and a democratic society rely on one another for their emergence.

Explaining the Global Digital Divide: Economic, Political and Sociological Drivers of Cross-National Internet Use

“…As in the case of political participation and control, a separate part of the Internet literature has focused on the question of whether this new medium can change social behavior and relationships by enhancing the nature and frequency of social interaction, and the density of voluntary association. Some studies have found such positive effects (Gibson, Howard and Ward 2000;Boneva and Kraut 2002;Hampton and Wellman 2002;Quan-Haase and Wellman 2002;Kavanaugh and Patterson 2002), while others have concluded that the Internet tends to alienate individuals from one another and to increase social isolation (Hern and Chaulk 2000;Nie, Hillygus and Erbring 2002;Franzen 2000:435). In some cases, isolation and psychological stress were found to increase during the early stages of use (Kraut et al 1998), but not after the user had acquired a longer online experience .…”

Blogging about diversity: the academy sounds off inThe Chronicle of Higher Education

“…The evolution of social media innovations has made it possible for people to connect over the internet (Kushin and Kitchener, 2009). Speaking on the impact of the internet, Hern and Chaulk (2000, p. 114) commented “the power of internet is that it allows individuals to transcend all the restraints that make local community time‐consuming, inefficient, limited, limiting and frustrating”. One such technological phenomenon, blogging, has risen dramatically in just a short time span.…”