ICT to Disempower? A Perspective on ICT as Postmodern Agent

Abstract:

The wholesale implementation of Information Technology (IT) has brought with it a host of unintended and unforeseen consequences. Through a literature review and an examination of both Postmodernism and IT, it is proposed that the influences of IT have acted and continued to act to promote Postmodernism. These influences amongst others include displacement of space and time, its promotion of the Information Society, its ability to create digital hyper-realities, its destructive influence on tradition and culture, and most of all its revolutionary impact on the identity. Through these influences this reflective paper seeks to demonstrate that the agency of IT (unintentionally) supports a Postmodern deconstructed societal structure.