Information economy is a term that characterizes an
economyEconomics is the social science that analyzes the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services. The term economics comes from the Ancient Greek from + , hence "rules of the house"...
with an increased emphasis on
informationInformation in its most restricted technical sense is a message or collection of messages that consists of an ordered sequence of symbols, or it is the meaning that can be interpreted from such a message or collection of messages. Information can be recorded or transmitted. It can be recorded as...
al activities and
information industryThe information industry or information industries are industries that are information intensive in one way or the other. It is considered one of the most important economic sectors for a variety of reasons....
.
The vagueness of the term has three major sources. First, not surprisingly, there is no agreed-upon definition regarding the threshold of when an economy is information economy and when it is not, just as there is no agreed threshold for an agricultural or industrial economy. This is partly because research has been focused on various "increases" in informational activities, rather than the level it has achieved. It is rare to see research seriously discussing whether a certain level of "informatization" in an economy is enough to label it as information economy.
Second, there are many different kinds of measurements of information-related economic indicators that are used by researchers. Unlike the first problem, the second problem is not the lack of attention, but the lack of agreement among various opinions.
Two related questions regarding the term are also noteworthy. In particular, there is some argument, most notably by
Manuel CastellsManuel Castells is a sociologist especially associated with information society and communication research....
, that information economy is not mutually exclusive with manufacturing economy. He finds that some countries such as
GermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
and
JapanJapan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
exhibit the informatization of manufacturing processes. In a typical conceptualization, however, information economy is considered a "stage" or "phase" of an economy, coming after stages of hunting, agriculture, and manufacturing. This conceptualization can be widely observed regarding
information societyThe aim of the information society is to gain competitive advantage internationally through using IT in a creative and productive way. An information society is a society in which the creation, distribution, diffusion, use, integration and manipulation of information is a significant economic,...
, a closely related but wider concept.
Third, there are numerous characterizations of the transformations some economies have undergone.
Service economyService economy can refer to one or both of two recent economic developments. One is the increased importance of the service sector in industrialized economies. Services account for a higher percentage of US GDP than 20 years ago...
, high-tech economy, late-capitalism,
post-fordismPost-Fordism is the name given to the dominant system of economic production, consumption and associated socio-economic phenomena, in most industrialized countries since the late 20th century...
, and
global economyEconomic globalization refers to increasing economic interdependence of national economies across the world through a rapid increase in cross-border movement of goods, service, technology and capital...
are among the most frequently used terms, having some overlaps and contradictions among themselves. Closer terms to information economy would include
knowledge economyThe knowledge economy is a term that refers either to an economy of knowledge focused on the production and management of knowledge in the frame of economic constraints, or to a knowledge-based economy. In the second meaning, more frequently used, it refers to the use of knowledge technologies to...
and
post-industrial economyA post-industrial economy refers to a period of growth within an industrialized economy or nation in which the relative importance of manufacturing lessens and that of services, information, and research grows.Such economies are often marked by:...
.
See also
- precarity
The word precarity literally meant "precariousness", but is now used to mean existence without predictability or security, affecting material or psychological welfare...
- Digital economy
A digital economy is an economy based on electronic goods and services produced by an electronic business and traded through electronic commerce...
- Electronic business
Electronic business, commonly referred to as "eBusiness" or "e-business", or an internet business, may be defined as the application of information and communication technologies in support of all the activities of business...
- Electronic commerce
Electronic commerce, commonly known as e-commerce, eCommerce or e-comm, refers to the buying and selling of products or services over electronic systems such as the Internet and other computer networks. However, the term may refer to more than just buying and selling products online...
- Information superhighway
The information superhighway or infobahnwas a popular term used through the 1990s to refer to digital communication systems and the Internet telecommunications network. It is associated with United States Senator and later Vice-President Al Gore....
- Information market
Although information has been bought and sold since ancient times, the idea of an information marketplace is relatively recent. The nature of such markets is still evolving, which complicates development of sustainable business models...
- Information revolution
- Information society
The aim of the information society is to gain competitive advantage internationally through using IT in a creative and productive way. An information society is a society in which the creation, distribution, diffusion, use, integration and manipulation of information is a significant economic,...
- Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
- Creative industry
- Knowledge economy
The knowledge economy is a term that refers either to an economy of knowledge focused on the production and management of knowledge in the frame of economic constraints, or to a knowledge-based economy. In the second meaning, more frequently used, it refers to the use of knowledge technologies to...
- Knowledge market
A knowledge market is a mechanism for distributing knowledge resources. There are two views on knowledge and how knowledge markets can function. One view uses a legal construct of intellectual property to make knowledge a typical scarce resource, so the traditional commodity market mechanism can be...
- Knowledge policy
Policies are the paradigms of government and all bureaucracies. Policies provide a context of rules and methods to guide how large organizations meet their responsibilities. Organizational knowledge policies describe the institutional aspects of knowledge creation, management, and use within the...
- Virtual economy
A virtual economy is an emergent economy existing in a virtual persistent world, usually exchanging virtual goods in the context of an Internet game...
Also, see The Effective Executive by Peter Drucker(1966) Drucker describes the manual worker (page 2) that works with his hands and produces "stuff". The knowledge worker (page 3) works with his head and produces ideas, knowledge, and information.
Additional reading
- Boyett, Joseph H. And Jimmie T. Boyett. 2001. The Guru Guide to the Knowledge Economy. John Wiley& Sons. John Wiley & Sons
- Cozel, Diane. 1997. The Weightless World. MIT Press.
- Evans, Philip B. and Thomas S. Wurster. 2000. Blown to Bits. Harvard Business School Press.
- Mcgee, James and Lawrence Prusak. 1993. Managing Information Strategically. Random House
- Negroponte, Nicholas. 1996. Being Digital.
- Rayport, Jeffrey F. and John J. Sviokla. 1995. Exploiting the Virtual Value Chain. in: Harvard Business Review (no. 1995)
- Rifkin, Jeremy. 2000. The Age of Access. Penguin Putnam.
- Schwartz, Evan I. 1999. Digital Darwinism. Broadway Books.
- Shapiro, Carl and Hal R. Varian. 1999. Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy. Harvard Business School Press.
- Tapscott, Donald. 1996. The Digital Economy. McGraw-Hill.