Network Theories of Power - Manuel Castells

thank you for your patience and still enduring yet another presentation I will try to make it as less painful as possible or basically Kareem gave my definitive power yesterday David gave my typology of that word power today so I think I can keep it very brief and and and finish off the matter let me just give you a couple of warning which I I think for me they are important in terms of our the communication and our work for me I have theory is special I have a very instrumental view of theory theory is useful to produce knowledge through research different kinds of research through research it's not a goal in itself I am NOT saying this is much something that has to be for every word that for me how I use it and therefore anytime that some Theory doesn't necessarily fulfill its heuristic role I just read through the window and forget about it and actually at the aisle by my students do the same including certain in my own theory so what I'm going to present is simply not is not the definitive theory but power network power but the theory that I have used at the end of my research on on power in the networked society and and that at least in what I have investigated in the book that was just published was useful for me and is up to the breeders commentators colleagues to see if that really makes sense in relationship to the empirical evidence I gather so let let me very clear about that that I'm not trying to have a normative framework here by simply communicating in a formal way what has been my experience of theorizing on power in the networked society second thing for me theory is also specific to context is never in my opinion general theory of everything and then entire human experience for me here is a specific context and the theory had developed is specific to the type of social structure which I propose that it's a characteristic of the key process in our world which I called the global network society and therefore it's difficult to really evaluate too much of it without referring to the entire analysis on the networked society but since I'm not going to summarize the three volumes in five minutes this is in the background and we can engage the discussion if you are interested so this having this been said let me try to summarize briefly some of the elements for your consideration of course power relationships are are for me the fundamental the foundational relationships in society and in fact in all societies because whoever has power determines the rules and values of the institutions and from there everything derives fortunately power is always countered by counter power wherever there is the domination there is resistance to domination this is the only I would say general law of humankind there's never one-sided power is always power and counter power and that what makes it interesting and the different compromises strategies agreements to which people arrive or don't arrive and determine the forms of society die they're constantly challenged constantly evolving because of that so it's a very dynamic system even if from the perspective of the individual sometimes the system doesn't move but the system moves and moves and in this I profoundly in agreement with bruno latour moves to the actions of individuals who build each other's networks that produce in structures that crystallize in institutions that shape human behavior but this human behavior is constantly constantly reignited three initiated by the actions of individuals doing mobilizing act or simply living in terms of their projects and industries and interest under the domination of social structures so in this particular context of the global network society which for me again I consider are the specific social structure that has been produced by recent history and which is characterized to large extent by the fact that the key social processes and organizational forms are organized in networks which are enacted activated operated through micro electronic based technologies of communication digital transmissions which really explain largely the characteristics of the networks the same way we could not talk about the industrial society without referring to the forms of production and distribution of energy that were specific to the industrial society we cannot refer to the networked society without referring to the technological paradigm social technological paradigm in which the societies based and therefore yes networks are fundamental networks had been a very old form of human existence and human organization and that and I concur with David networks are at the origin of humankind but again these network the networks that constitute our lives at different networks for kind of reason but one fundamental one a fundamental one is a the technology of networks so the what I have attempted in the last years is to address the how network how power relationships work in the context of this global network society and after a long battle with my data my observations and after reading David's book truly so and after talking to Peter manji on the matter he we likely destroyed many of my theories of power in networks usefully I think criticism when it is constructive is deep form of producing something I came out at least with a with with the notion that I have to differentiate different forms of power always exercised through networks and then go more specifically into trying to see which were the fundamental aspects in each form of power in relationship to the operation of power in the networks that organize our lives then why I came to this typology that David refer very quickly and I will I will go slightly more slowly into the matter so that I did not simply repeat what he said I differentiate between network empower network power network power and network making power networking power refers simply to the power of the actors and organizations including in the networks that constitute the core of the global network society over human collectives or individuals who are not included in these global networks these are quite fundamental in terms of of distinctions in terms of policy for instance like the global network economy is based precisely in integrating people who have valued the returns who had value and excluding people territories the chatter that had no value as either produces or consumers origin the entire global economy is organized for this segmented variable geometry of the economy so this is very concrete in terms of people's life and of course in in in terms of Science and Technology and information about this point about two hundred three hundred universities depending on how you can't produce 85% of the knowledge index in cell science Citation Index and the and this is I index so in every aspect there is a tremendous disparity between what is included what is excluded and that is a major form of power we say academic power that is the power the power of individuals and institutions included in this network over there once the Devas are created on this inclusion and exclusionary logic that Tanya and Wilson explained to us yesterday then the critical thing is to keep this exclusion in in terms of the interest of those who are in the network to keep out those who are not in the network and so maintain this power and this is the network gatekeeping theory that that Kareem Barcelona Han has so well spelled out although in her presentation here yesterday she showed also they the fuzzy boundaries of this gatekeeping but still the fundamental notion is through gatekeeping that those who are in the network keep is a table that keeps power over those who are not in the network simply because they are not and so that's one fundamental form of power but I would say not the only one the second one that I can see is for those who are in the network at network power that I define exactly in the same terms that David did in his book analyzing globalization which is in because any social action and any Network action requires social coordination coordination requires standards and so the standards that enable global coordination in his terms Display Network power so the network power is the power of the standards or in my terminology protocols of communication that determines the rules to be accepted once in the network and in this case the power is exercised not by exclusion from the networks but by the imposition of the rules of inclusion you can come into the network member of the club by the club has rules and these rules had been already created and then maybe fluid processes of bending the rules or not under certain circumstances and this of course depends on the embedment of the relationship of power which are already in the network a third form is what I call network power which to some extent it's at the same time the simplest way of understanding power but probably the most the most complicated they once you are in the network some people in the network have power over the others now I would immediately introduce here the notion of the different forms of power in the jester we were starting to discuss you go throughout the history of theory there in fact it can be simplified to two forms two basic forms of power which of course coexist in all societies coercive power the power of ultimately of the monopoly of violence being legitimate or not as we were saying is ultimately a guy with a gun and then what I personally think is extremely important persuasion power the power to construct the meaning the the meaning of action in the minds of the people to some extent to simplify weather and gram see or bevor and Foucault which is more or less so two forms of power which always combine in different proportions ultimately they the power the idea that you can intimidate if you necessary by recurring to the use of force and force by by the norms of society also creates constraints the way in which people are going to perceive the reality and therefore is also a form of constructing meaning but fundamentally we understand each other the construction of meaning an imposition of will are two different forms of power which combine in in their in their articulation I do think that throughout history but particularly in our society the second form of power meaning the capacity to construct meaning through these courses is the fundamental one because ultimately power that relies primarily or essentially in violence and the possibility of violence is a with power it's a weak power and people change the way they think about their life about their the structure where they live down the line institutions change the down the line means maybe years and years of suffering tears torture everything but ultimately shaping the minds is more effective than torturing the bodies regardless of how much torture you can inflict let's talk about the ran in a few years now with this context book how does network power operate the easy answer the answer that in research we often do is simply examining how power operates in one particular network so that's so the answer is research so can be micro social network and we we have a long tradition establishing how power operates can be in my case for instance analyzing the global financial markets and and seeing how power operates in the global financial markets and how in fact a number of mechanism the lack of regulation to the ability to be evaluated by by assessing institutions condition the way the global financial markets work and ultimately all economic power in the world all depends on valuation in the global financial markets and this is a particular form of power that we have identified for a number of years with many people have been working on that and we have a relatively solid fear about how the economies - Azure markets and how financial markets are controlled by information turbulences together with mekinese evaluation which are more and more subjective and less and less related to the rules of the market or if we analyze the the military power we can also go into geopolitical analysis we can see the net worth of geopolitical domination Amitai power can identify the United States at the center of this power and therefore there is a hierarchical Network although with alliances interactions and strategic partnerships so again that's not difficult to do theoretically sometimes they're difficult to do practically but that's in a simple problem problem is when we ask the question in more general terms who has the network power in the global network society meaning the unified source of power and that the answer is totally undetermined because the only answer would be a global power elite which is simply empirically wrong has not we had never been able to identify such a thing the notion of a unified power elite may have been related to some Central American Republic some people in including the United States both have have the idea of doing that Berlusconi has strongly tried to do that in Italy but it's not so there is always a much more complicated process now it doesn't mean that domination doesn't insist or that is fragmented no what happens is that there are different forms of power in each Society economic political cultural scientific Chatterton which are organized in different networks of power which then establish different relationships of networking between the different angles of paths but this is always negotiated relationship fuzzy relationships not a unified relationship and that's why is so important to make the differentiation between the power elite and the formation of ad hoc specific power elites in relationship to specific historical context so in theoretical terms that means we have to have a clear idea of who has the network power in the different networks and then a specific analysis of how these different network powers connect to each other without necessarily simplifying the mekinese in one single form of domination because ultimately one could say well the global financial markets could be the critical ones but they depend on regulation regulation depends on political decision making but political decision-making depends on the political process which ultimately it depends on the media but the media that's have dependent on the global finance or market through advertising and at the same time they are dependent on regulation from the government and we and this is not the circular argument is simply a diversified complex system of political and power decision-making which connects different networks of power so to some extent I would say that the question of power as traditionally formulated makes not much sense in the in the networked society which is so differentiated in terms of the autonomy of its den words but at the same time domination and determination in how people organize their lives it's alive and well and the most crucial form of power is what I follow the logic of what I call Network making power and men were making power simply operates through two basic mechanism first the ability to constitute the network to form networks and to program and reprogram the networks in ways such that the automated logic of the network favors the interests of those who have interests or values of those who have programmed the networks let's say simple things Breton boots 1944 or the establishment in the global economy in the in the 1980s of the Washington Consensus this is a program this is a problem no regulation free flow of capital that this is a particular program the constitution of the WTO free free trade for commodities but not for labour so all these are not necessarily logical decision making is reflecting rules that then work in the global network which depend on the ability of the of the programmers here is the world to program the network or intellectual property rights legislation or ultimately in technology standards standards there was a time in the 1980s where the telecom operators of the world were trying to establish treaties for the signal to go from one country to another with a border so to go from France to Germany you have to have the sign treaty between the German telecom and the French telecom and that was the logic actually in technology of Minitel which was a completely self-contained French system from the post of it top-down that was supported by the internet but that was the logic okay so that was one particular form of a standard that was programmed so here I'm not talking about the power of the standard but the power of those who establish the program of certain type of standards that were on the other hand there is a second form of network making power which is the ability to connect and to ensure the cooperation of different networks by sharing common goals and combining resources and at the same time fending off competition from other networks which are not in the cooperation agreements the first mechanism is programming the second mechanism is switching and so we do have holders of power this is not an abstract notion of power that dissolves in in the networked society the programmers have network making power and the switcher has make network making power who are the programmers and the switches well they are people they are individual they are not abstracting the capitalist class is an abstract thing I have never met in the street the capitalist class what but I did know a lot of capitalists a lot of capitalists who tried to forward their injuries but they cannot do everything they want so they have to program something that takes care of their interest while they are at work like global financial markets or a number of institutions or the property law the intellectual property rights law and then you try to enforce the intellectual property rights in in the WTO a fundamental one and you don't try to enforce environmental concerns in the WTO so you see that that the critical thing about about programming now I would say even more that these the programmers have are individuals actors as we say not to say individual but I'm going to say more and more individual first supporting brunella tools old likely the reincarnation of Gabrielle third murder but Bruno always started from that point and building then actors on the basis of networks of individuals so that's exactly how see the process being formed individuals start as individuals but they connect and they build networks among themselves to then build structural and institutional neighbors that will fill them interest and if we go into trying to route as I'm desperately trying with with the permission of Antonio Hannah DiMaggio to ultimately route this in the brain if we don't have a connecting point that goes through the individual is no way we are going to bridge a scientific view of society that goes from the brain to the social structures and therefore we live in separate worlds and we will not see humans in the same way now but of course they are mediation lots of mediations but the starting point and the connection of these are the networks from the individual brain to the social forms of organization institution goes through brains who connect to other individuals in terms of their cut of the construction of the network network that become active networks and this actor nagels programming the different networks and then switching switching again is fundamental because it D networks are separate there is no way to make coherent the standards of domination in a society and therefore at one point they the financial firms and the political authority and the media corporate executives have to find I can say sit together in a room and decide the world but they have to find forms of sharing and cooperating in the organization of the entire system those who are at this at the heart of the switching mechanism which I call the switchers are extremely powerful individuals these are those who use the fuzziness that Kareem talks about in the gatekeeping into making fuzzy for the others but not for them sorry fuzzy for them but not for the others to block the fasteners in in the outside world and my example I have analyzed empirically and a couple of articles there today is the perverted Murdock as the guy who connects the communication network the media network with a political neighbor with financial networks he changes his political attitudes completely from one moment to another depending on strategies but he keeps always the switching power like one of his strategies in the United States but has a global strategy is to provide ideology to the Republicans and money to the Democrats as a way to switch with the political power and in England switching from shifting from supporting the Conservatives to support in Blair in terms of the regulatory advantages that he obtained from the Blair government but again and all these different forms of connection are linked yes to his corporation News Corp but News Corp is actually still family control and is still personally controlled by by murder same thing in terms of switching between different networks such as the academic scientific Network and the military Network the switchers and MIT would not exist without them elite the connection to the military network and another universities as well but it might is the clearest case and this is au case no no ideological critique here simply saying you need a switch to which in that particular case is both a combination of the university initiatives and they and the Defense Department initiatives you have the you need this weekly switching between the two networks in order to ensure the domination of MIT in the technology scientific model one of the leading institution the world thanks to the huge amounts of funds received from the Defense Department and at the same time MIT and other institutions providing the u.s. with the most important source of military power which is superior technology and constantly renewed superior technology so this kind of switching is what is necessary now does it mean that all the programming and switching mechanism at hoc and we do not we cannot develop in in overall theoretical interpretation not really yes and no if we're going to the details of the programming and switching everything specific to the network to the context but what I have found in my investigation is that there is something common in all cases the programs are built what I call at ideation or materials on on images on cultural materials on ideas on projects in other word there is a common cultural glue in the deeper sense of of culture in order to to be able to relate to each other there is something that comes from the wall of ideas that then shapes the forms and the witch networks our program and constructed discourses in the in the Foucault lien sense and therefore because ultimately ideas materialize in the brains of social actors ultimately otherwise ideas per se don't exist ideas are rooted in the brains of social actors and therefore the key Network making process consists in connecting human networks via communication networks and that why I think the fundamental at least in our society I don't notice in our data meaning the global network society the fundamental form of constructing network making power is related to the communication drone and to communication networks because every brain is individual but what is common to all of us is that we receive the materials with which we construct meaning on the basis of our socialized communication environment and if therefore the different forms of shaping and control of communication networks has a sentence has an edge on the ways in which we receive information we process information we match the ideas at etcetera that one of the oldest things in media research is that the most important thing in terms of what the media do or don't in terms of the of people's ability to construct their lives is not what they media say is what the media don't say he said icon is a diatomic thing you are in you're out that's another gatekeeping and that why the media had been doing gatekeeping for a long time what was not published for a long time in the new york times didn't exist or in the three major American members or in the UC so the gatekeeping function of the media has been fundamental and that why now is being shaken because that's what I wanted to add in conclusion that they at the same time that we have this mechanism of construction of power in the narrow society we still have of of course as in any society mechanisms of counter power make an attack counter the domination that is established in the institution that is renewed by power relationships - because societies are different people are not passive they try something else they resist a challenge they produce their own things that's the interesting thing about society that never stops and maybe tiring but not boring and and in that sense the the way in which counter power is exercised is exactly symmetrical so social actors of all kinds trying to reprogram the network's so programming and counter programming like alright in the global financial market the only the only consideration is profit making ok let include and let's debate that instead of just profit making in the in the valuation of the stocks of companies their ecological or environmental responsibility should be included as a number of social movements have been trying and actually succeeded or if they don't do it directly to the glory namsom market in the way the companies are perceived like boycotting naik for the use of of child labour until actually like stop the practice and many other company so in the program of the multinational companies a number of new criteria had been introduced from the civil society and from social actors changing the program of profit-making as the only program of the company to the point that then companies have tried started to use their social responsibility I said second derivatives to Greece their profit but you understand is is to increase their profit buying pre increasing market share but at the same time the mechanism of formation of profit valuation becomes different or in more fundamental ways the fundamentalist if the problem that you introduce in living human action is not the power of money but the power of God and you've introduced in the logic of societies and in the log in the minds of the people that the values of God are more important than the values of the stocks this completely changes the program under which societies are created and we make of course is a great challenge be furious against it but it's a different program that that in not only in in the usual suspects in Islamic countries but atheism but if we do but in the Knights they remember significant proportion about 20% of the American electorate alive Angelica's with therefore in the in this in the system they introduce other things with simply the management of the country they will be in of the economy God is more important so that's a change of the other program and finally it's the in terms of this switching mechanism also the form of counter power is related to disrupting the switches a key switches in the in the in the connection between Keener goes 40 when people mobilize to change the way the FCC was operating under the Bush administration in terms of managing net neutrality people mobilizing bloc actually a number of decisions that completely disrupted the type of switch between the the US government the US Congress and the industry that have to take into consideration citizen rights to communication and ultimately the persistence to power in the networks also takes place through and by networks organizational forms are also networks have completely changed these are not any longer labor unions these are not any longer mass political parties these are different types of movements actions semis spontaneous or not collective actions organized in Negros and we shouldn't be too much surprised by it because that was the history of social movements and social protest says that the ways in which society is organized in terms of power relationships produces the organizational form that I use a strangest of resistance by those who oppose example the labor movement in the 19th century early 20th century was born in the large in the large factories was born in the types of industrial organization structures that were typical of the early industrial society and all the key labor movement were organized there using the socialization of production as the way to organize the socialization of labor in a struggle so in a networked society in which domination operates through Network resistance operates also through networks and ultimately it is networks against networks in a logic of cultural materials being fought over the minds of the people by connecting or disconnecting human brains organizational human networks brain networks organizational Negros and cultural networks and that's what I found after eight years of work individuals what about the collective's of being switchers by themself like our new structure so while these individual only not well it's probably a matter of not just and enology but how you look into the process of formation of the actor because at the root there's always an individual right so then it's a second third order of interaction individuals form collectives but how and why this individual from the collectives and what which are the results of the collectives in relationship to individual depend ultimately on individuals the only thing that I would add there is that not only individuals are equal I mean let's say that a collective of network activists and let's say there are two examples of collective action spontaneous networks of protests that those formed constant in the world around mobile communication Twitter's etc there they are individuals who by responding to someone or to something suddenly form a collective okay we understand that now more organized or stable collectives let's say they precisely the movement to control FCC in the United States well some individuals start and then they form a loose structure very loosely structure and others in other individual join because they follow they believe or or they continue that that trend the faction however who joins and why they join may change the collective so it is not never going to be a top-down Authority they're going to be a constant fuzzy relationship between the first movers and the others and and one of the things that we have not studied well in social movements by the way is who were so some how and who were in the social movement before this is or grow up you know who are they the initiator who are the movers so if the initiators of the network that becomes a collective that becomes a collective action are very important and they cannot simply be dissolved as part of of a movement you see the der characteristics are important and a good social history of social movement has to see who did that and why under which conditions I don't have the power clarity of these descriptions and the way you interrelate four types of power it is you know that the third type the network power is maybe less typical of the modern of the global network society than the others this diversified system of competing powers if I think of the Italian Renaissance you have the financial network of the Medici you had the media network of the Vatican dominating the old use the time you have the King of France using Swiss mercenaries invading the land all these were competing powers so what does this third type of power oh please really typical of almost local design you are right but it's not typical no no because one thing I'm saying not the reverse of the other I'm not saying that all these only exists in the networked society the other three are more dependent on technology but I wouldn't even mind about if they exist or not what I say in the society I observe these four from these four forms of networked power exists and what exists in other societies is up to the historians but the network structure does not she they never started a shape that that's the shape no no is not is not competition remember what what I try to say and the network power which is what people the first reaction of people will say Network okay but within the network everybody agrees network outside the network is easy everybody agrees well after some brilliant works around here everybody agrees that people who are keep at the gate barbarians at the gate are not in the network and they don't have the power until they overrun the gate of course so but then people say well huh but who are those within the network how we know who are in power and that that were my my my response is totally relativistic insane depends on the network depends on the network and the only thing I'm trying to say and it these network may or may not connect and the important thing is the programs and that the fourth type but now by saying depends on the network depends on the goals of a particular network on the components and on the technology of the network so the technology they are each import the lysosome generic definition of network power but the resection but it exists they said form of coffee it's always that my my basic answer is always specific disagree with you all good and network the fire neither willpower not net Network really enlightening to make you could drop both however they call it higher but my first question is parallel to what is not fast oh I mean what is lost if we can pilot out and network I begin to be tied back to the world because in fact what you mean is the answer is electronically mediated social action I mean this is when various electronic mediation some sort of social technical electronic band back that's what we really knew an original right but at this difficulty but it seems to me better large part of the expansion of the world networking social fairy remember I mean 15 years ago network was used to deliver matchup it was really of a weak link in both part of it away I mean Joey why or winner Tony well it was a very marginal so now it's a jiminy we have to understand why and a large part about it personality disagree with me but it seems there is a petitioner that it's the cold of a traceability of social competence and of cognitive activity which we then look at everything as a network to its top you see what I mean virtual it's not that we study specific event let's call it let's call them electronically mediated but if we look at the medicines now we'll use the exam as a network it's precisely because something has happened in the way we interpret every single phenomena now which we before would have been understood in terms of territory in the society that the macro in this edition I thought it is very something what has happened is the micro electronic revolution communication information technologies exactly that what has happened and that why the networks are different now however it doesn't mean that everything has to be mediated to the computer but in practice everything is mediated to a computer similarity angry I think it's not really confusing with network now because it means simultaneous you feel mystery and which other destroyers TV through them and some aspect is regional I'm not forget that the third book with a world network the power is to mutant to not electricity and Edison so everything it has nothing to do its electricity to things power you confuse the same where you similar countries are the concept of social fairy and I disagree i'm tami with web pages beginning with terrible encounter we can discard it if we are not able to very clear and solitary when it means we do nothing scientific in social sciences and discomfort discarded and say well I do this work backward and we have to be precise about we you will submit industry were to describe infinite world and a concept and the concept we studied which actually many everything so I want to disagree with more sure it is very completely with you not with that to never serious I read but when I said that say maybe target is having a bad effect on you but but not seriously speaking the power is not everywhere power power relationship are very specifically defined I define very specifically except that had been defined three times before me so I ID and insist but I I would reiterate by my definition of power relations and so power is one particular form of relationship I'm just saying is the fundamental one because whoever whoever has power shapes the institutions and norms of society according to his herder so in that sense power is very specific is not many of the things we do in society don't involve power relationships except in a very implicit way linked to domination which for me is power tries to like crystallizing the institution of society it's a different thing power is relational domination is institutional which is always unstable because of the relational thing so this is not that everything powers in in everything the issue is about how power in an Edward well then we go back to the notion that what power in if we live in a networked society that's what I said huh sorry that this context in which I place this and and I do not go through out why with it it is about a networked society in which the core activities in the economy in culture in politics in military terms everything is organized the core activity is not everything the activities that shape and condition the rest are organized in networks networks which are specific to our form of socio technical organization because they are and they have grown out of the information communication technology revolution very much like the industrial society grew out of new forms of production and distribution of energy okay now networks in other societies of course existed of but they are not the same networks because if you have an indicator not a network that constitute our society is a very different form to have the the Venetian base capitalist class merchant class organizing nervous in the Mediterranean than the global financial market today is it it's not only quantitative difference a qualitative difference because of the volume size and speed of the transaction and in that sense my my observation not simply a theory I don't do theories remember I don't do theories I try to make sense of what my observation is and and in my observation the way power is organized in networks is today entirely dependent of the technology of the neighbors and that's why I undo networks in general or history of networks and I don't say they are networked here not never there throughout history there have been very important forms of organza which are networks together with others today they are dominant and answering your point about why now we talk about never because now every major process activity organization in the world is organized in our networks which are operated through the new form of information communication technology that's exactly why now we talk networks and throughout history we have talked networks sometimes bureaucracies other times hierarchies and now we talk on 'mentally networks for the reason that through the technology networks have become pervasive interactive interconnected at least that to make explicit the terms of our disagreement should we take the questions and then you give a collective response we try a very short one well no no no no no nice ok you can you can make collective the underlying theme we've heard throughout the conference we heard again today is that those who that are excluded from the network are less powerful and I would argue that that's not always true and then in fact a network and by implication the members that work can have more or less power based on who it is that's not billeted from the network so sometimes the excluded members are in fact the more powerful actors and network forms because the less powerful actors try to develop some kind of a counter power to try to compensate for that we see that for example in small business networks we've seen it in again another study that I did in police organizations where they want they built a network to share data about drug trafficking among you know several dozen cities but there was one large city that refused to participate and it was one that had all the data it was the one that held almost all the data and so it really was much more powerful being scored from the network than the network was itself and I wonder how we can build that kind of picture of viewpoint into the theory which also says they could be that excluded can also be much less powerful that's absolutely a very relevant point look the way I see it is that networks are dominant visa vie those who are not in network in relationship to the programs of that particular network okay so you can have people excluded from that network but building on creating another network on other types of values and goals for instance you can have the network of people who are protected in terms of law and order by the police etc and then you can have the criminal network that has a different goal and that ultimately can overrun this first network but the point is that the hypothesis is that without forming networks with the power to impose their goals to other networks which are in conflict or in competition then you are powerless Vasavi the network but you are powerful in your network and then we go into a second order analysis which is competition and confrontation between different networks sometimes with share goals and then they can negotiate so they compete in relationship to the same goal like market share in terms of television networks and Internet companies networks or they can control each other like in the case of law and order but so you're absolutely right the power Vasavi they excluded from one network depends on the goals of the network and on the relative importance of the network visa vie they a function of society absolutely question programmers and switchers you want to distinguish the kinds of programmers and kinds of switchers in relation to those that use domination to back up their programming retirement networks and their ability to switch networks so considered Murdoch right he's a programmer of his media networks because he's an employment contract he's salting what the coven's channels he's a switcher because of that same reason with people in political class want access to because he has that domination based power over his network making right but other people so just have a good idea and people crystal you know you're at the center of a research network not because you're in somebody's programming identity through persuasive forms of communication not because you have any access to forms of domination so is there is there a distinction there is there sort of kinds of programmers and kinds of switchers that you what about there which are parasitic on other forms of domination which are internal to the networks emergent characteristics absolutely and programmers can be a same time teachers or not I prefer conceptually to defense hit them even if it one actor plays playful droves look after all the question is theoretical in principle abstract but it's not too abstract networks operate very efficiently including on a screen they are almost automated self-regulating mechanism one they have a clear goal a program and it's set of operating procedures I'm not perfectly but the market is a network right the market is a network and can have different goals and different operating procedures depend on the regulation by the political network so ultimately programmers are those who individuals correct connected in networks linked to the situation history can program one but the goals and operating procedure one particular Network and then switchers are those who establish the negotiation the coordination between different networks excluding other backwards from the negotiation and building something if Murdoch is able to connect with the political system in Britain and integrate Blair that means that the Guardian is going to be left out right that the BBC is going to start having problems and and even real problems so that one particular way of switching and now you murder because it's very clear but there are many more and more interesting elements of negotiation and well first and I'm not so sure that me or Peter or not we don't have forms of the of domination not tell our students about it but but the ones the network that has been less explored for obvious reasons you will tell me the obvious reason is the connection between the academic scientific networks and the business networks which really create agendas with program the universities universities suddenly start you know start researching about networks for instance why because the corporations are extremely interested on our intellectual property right every time I talk to one of these tycoons they want to know what people do in in Facebook right Jonathan how people behave in the internet what happened here what happened there and it's only when some people reminding okay but we want a free internet a free everything if their internet company they are for the free internet no problem just to attract traffic there are a media corporation then start having problems and they only want to talk about intellectual property right so so the the switching of the networks and who that the switching and who is the dominant switcher there has tremendous consequences the practical life of all the neighbor so what I pretend frankly is that the kind of questions I have been trying to investigate are very down-to-earth in terms of the practice of power in different dimensions of society but the critical point is really with Janet before which networks I mean exclusion is not the people in the Internet and the people outside the internet that's a clear exclusion but if we talk about networks in general which programs exclude really from important functions other networks or which programs in fact create a counter network that ultimately can organize a competition you need more in more effective terms no I something different instead of your scholarly analysis an opinion I wanted of yours on the recent Supreme Court ruling that made corporations essentially as powered as individuals from his free speech and a number of other implications that are floated because you said it's individuals but now it may be more so non individuals but to go to your you know cooperatives or collective collectives some other phrase and then this has strong implications I feel with the game well you are right and Begley you are right I just would say that ultimately corporations are run by individuals right and and individuals aggregated in boards in collectives etcetera etcetera and that ultimately these corporations are located in with these management teams aggregated individuals create well yes and no you are right technically you are right but you know bundled donations I mean they have never stopped participating through lobbying bundle donations every mechanism but I would say to some extent this ruling is kind of a one of day of the network which is the judicial network being taken over by the political network which which is not necessarily the current administration but the the political ideas planted in the brains of the Supreme Court judges who were there and then at one particular point seeing the political network losing certain type of control they try to reinstate another type of control at the level of the judicial by opening up the gate that is and keeping the gate for the connection between corporations and and the political process so substituting for for for that for that process so but if you want to say that it's not individual actors all the time you are right I'm just I'm trying to keep some connection to the individual actor because otherwise I cannot connect to the Masters brains and so because then to jump from the individual brain to the collective brain things become much more complicated it's complicated and not like this and they're going to solve the problem on me but that that way my effort of still trying to keep some level of continuity and not discontinuity here here is the human being and here is the society which in that sense maybe is one of the things that you and I agree one of the few that they think the opposition between individual and society has been hunting social scientists all our life even when we created psychology instead of saying you know the clinical study of the brain and personality to actually create an intermediate category when the social structure had to be individualized at one point but I hope that one day we will get rid of psychology we just have newer science and social science directly word but it's a comment and it's trying to continue I think there's just no question that power is is a sadly understudied phenomena in contemporary social sciences years ago Jim March wrote this very important essay to power power where age initially said no one's been able to measure it should we expense with studying and Williamson comes along in 85 and what is he called a tush you know it's just stuff we don't look at because it exists it's obviously inefficient you pick up a PSR and you couldn't find an article on power for a decade who disagrees you hit pretty telling and yet at the same time I'm struggling I think I agree fruit of it that I'm not sure we gain a lot when we take a phenomenon and mash it up with the theory and so it would almost be just as happy hearing the talk they called the technology of power and suppose the networks of power and I think many eat glue got into studying networks did that because they wanted to be closer to action they wanted to somehow capture float they made a relational turn in some sense that was a kind of vision of social theory and I could imagine your programmers in switchers idea it's just as useful for ancient Mesopotamia for Renaissance Florence for contemporary Los Angeles that those concepts are super valuable it seems to me but I don't see what I should take on board of thinking of modern technology mediated growth relationships as an network of power it seems like a form power and I just not there is a comment of you may say I disagree about the vibe there no sure sure no well I do think that technology is transformative and that is you go empirically into the analysis and it's definitely for one fundamental reason which is is in fact this is the network theory of power it's not Network powers it never fear power which in which the heart ultimately what is common is that they go through communication networks and and what is fundamental for me is that because ultimately the most important form of power is the construction of meaning in our minds through discourses we have entered only recently in in a world of constantly immersive interactive multi textual communication system and that's that new that historical anew and because this course is shaped minds and discourses are based on the communication environment in the communication environment changes because of the technology of communication fundamentally changes then it's a new form of power that we have to investigate that's at least by my approach so it's about communication

Channel: USC Annenberg

Views: 46,936

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Keywords: USC, USC Annenberg, Manuel Castells, network, theory

Id: skcUYhRaEas

Length: 66min 0sec (3960 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 02 2010