Contemporary Scientific Discourse of the Information Society: Concepts and Directions

Abstract

 This article considers new approaches to the concept of "information society". The author analyzes the development of the modern scientific discourse from the inception of this term in the 1960s. The analysis includes multidimensionality of the “information society" concept, which is caused by diversity of criteria used to describe and explain this concept. The article distinguishes factors that complicate the description and explanation of the qualitative state of the modern society as “information society". Such factors are primarily the following: specificity of information as a resource, specificity of HR as resources, general availability of means for producing information and the creation of the “information consumer — information producer" conglomerate; supra-material and extra spatial (extra-geographical) nature of human habitat and socium formed due to media communication; replacement of the market by a system of information networks (networked economy). The author also makes well-grounded assumptions as to a probable direction of newest developments in the “information society" concepts. In the author’s opinion, advanced researches both in the modern scientific discourse and in information society as its object will involve discovery of patterns in the new social being, definition of specifics of the new communicational reality, clarification of special characteristics of the functioning of social institutes, as well as measurement and tracking of human needs, values and changes in priorities.