ABSTRACT
This chapter explores research on the information society and some policy implications of the information society. It examines certain policy implications of the information society. The chapter explains the scholarly research accomplished to date on the information society implies policy alternatives for government officials in the United States, and in other nations. The new society differs in important ways from the past industrial society. Empirical indicators support the observation that a transition may presently be underway in American society. The research approach of Japanese communication scholars investigating the information society tends to focus on social problems. Japanese scholars of the information society find that Japan’s national information ratio is very high for its level of personal income. Comparative analyses of two or more information societies are surprisingly rare in the scholarly literature. The new information technologies of computers, satellites, and cable help move nations toward becoming information societies.
