ABSTRACT
The informational economy, on which the United States and other leading industrial states have staked the future, is profoundly implicated in a broad range of transformations, similar in scope to the radical changes brought about by the era of the industrial revolution. Transnational capitalism is continually reorganizing not only the system of production, but also the spheres of politics, social relations, knowledge, and cultural practice. Embedded in neoliberal economic and organizational restructuring, the digital mode of development (Castells, 1996) has altered relations among nations in ways that have broken traditional boundaries, territorial and other forms, and the spatial-temporal order of things. Digital capitalism, still mainly headquartered in the West and focused on the informational functions of production, circulation, and consumption, enables those in the promotional fields to push the frontiers of consumerism and the commodification of consciousness. The “sacred” character of nations and states poses no barrier to those wishing to bring them into the fold of spectacular consumption. And the new instruments of communication and informational and symbolic transfer excite such possibilities.
