Freedom in the Network Economy

Darin Barney’s “Network Economy” claims the rise of the network society has provided the structure for a global informational economy. Digital networks, he claims has transformed the industrial model of capitalism into an ‘informational’ model. The globalized informational economy has its own distinct characteristics, however, it holds the same logic of capitalism of an industrial economy.The change from a hierarchical to decentralized operational management is one of the important changes in practice in the informational species of capitalism.

Economic globalization has emerged from network technologies and refers to the multi-national organization of capitalist firms and their operations. Barney states this kind of economic model is neo-liberal since market agents are increasingly free of regulatory constraint and states lose their interventionist and redistributive options. We have seen this neo-liberal model challenged in current news. In response to the desire to increase government control and censorship, along with the increase of big companies extracting information about us online, a new network technology will soon be released that will decentralize the internet so “big brother,” or governments and big companies, will not be able to watch every search term we type online. This may pose some challenges to big companies who depend on online advertising.

The Freedom Box would decentralize information and power by simply plugging a small device into the wall. This small device could change the course and practice of our network society by providing liberty and freedom to those using it and further limiting control of our government. Eben Moglen, innovator of the Freedom Box, claims, “Everything we know about technology tells us that the current forms of social network communication, despite political value, are dangerous to use. They are too centralized; they are too vulnerable for state retaliation and control.” I would like to see the day when we are assured our online liberties and not vulnerable to the control of large databases, such as Facebook.