Locations and forms of power : is internet a 5th form of power

2.  Locations and forms of power

First, I’ld like to give a definition of the notion. Power is the ability to exercice authority and influence others. It can be exerted in different spheres : economy, politics, media… In relation to the notion, the topic of my presentation will be the new powers emerging in the 21st century.

We may wonder to what extent internet can be considered as a form of power and if this new form of power doesn’t finally prevail over classical forms of power.  

I/  The classical forms of power

There are various means of power, but the basic ones are the executive, the legislative and judicial powers. Those are the cement of modern democracies.

A new form of power has emerged in the 19th and especially 20th century :  the press power, usually referred to as the 4th power .

The media have become so influential that they are considered as a power in itself.

Some newspapers specialized in political « bashing »are even making investigations on  political misconducts and behave as a strong counter power of the 3 other powers.

However, on the verge of the 21st century, this press power based on newspapers is suddenly disappearing to the benefit of information through internet as it is described in the article of CNN « From paper to the screen ». Doc 1

Lots of newspapers are shutting down by lack of readers and those remaining have to think a different model of promotion for their chronicles.

They indeed develop through internet website, the young generations being very addicted to their smartphone and high speed internet connexion, that give them access instantly to the last breaking news of the moment.

Nowadays and by extension, the 4th power refers to the various means of communication, and in particular internet

Internet has developped so much in the last decades and its power is so great on the citizens’everyday life that we can wonder if internet is not in itself a 5th power.

2/ Internet, the new 5th power ?

With the emergence of internet, the way information are broadcasted have evolved.

That’s what is called the « fifth power ». It can be partly defined as the power of the internet.

The major difference with the press lays in the fact that internet has popularized the access to information. Anyone can have access to it and make its own contribution through such sites as Wikipedia.

Steve Jobs who died in 2011 and his company Apple as long as the GAFA, powerful companies ruling  internet Google, apple, facebook and amazon, have allowed people to get a quick access to information . Steve Jobs with the I phone, Google as the nbr 1 search engine and all the problems that its monopoly situation raises (doc2), Facebook as the most popular and influent social network and Amazon as the biggest retailer on internet.

We may wonder whether it is because of that dissemination of information that Wikileaks has had such an impact.  WikiLeaks is an international online not-for-profit media organization founded by Australian activist Julian Assange that has published and made available to the public a huge number of classified, uncensored and highly sensitive documents from various anonymous news sources. Its website, which opened in 2006, collected a database of more than 1.2 million documents in the first year alone. 

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