ABSTRACT
What good does it do a developing economy to try to leap into the information age? And how does that attempt transform the economy itself? By now a large body of literaturemuch of it largely hortatory-has explored the global information future’s implications for economic and political institutions in the world of the early twenty-first century (Ohmae, 2000; Dertouzos, 1997). With a very few notable exceptions (Castells, 2000; Estabrooks, 1995), most commentators on the rise of what Castells terms “informational capitalism” address themselves to an audience largely situated in the most advanced countries. Most, whether praising or damning the advent of the information age, concur on one point: proliferating communication and coordination through networks based on “information and communications technology” (ICT) accelerate globalization, erode boundaries, and pass initiative and power into the hands of the global corporation, undermining the capacity of national states to control the flow of information or capital. Odd, then, that China’s Communist Party-led state, which attempts to maintain control over political information flows, and still plays a leading role in strategic economic sectors, should so warmly embrace the information age.
