Danger
Info-Society exclusion

The clarion call of black community media activists is especially relevant in the light of the dire predictions of information social scientists.

In all probability the Information Age of the next millennium will be dominated by a tiny information elite.

New research findings by Jan van Dijk of Utrecht University, Information Society Forum EU support this proposition.

• Less than 15 per cent of the populations of European nations will be in the top rank of advanced information activities: controlling the content and access to information and media decision making.
• Middle class and educated households and most office workers will make up the major users, about 55 per cent.
• In the bottom thirty per cent will be the excluded, largely low-income households, women, the disable, the elderly, and black and ethnic minorities. They will be deprived of the simple applications of IT in banking, shopping, entertainment, and information

The spectre is one of IT as a control technology, used by a few to suppress the many.

There is a need specifically for policies to prevent structural inequality.
This should include, among other policies, a commitment to:

• Information access for all
• Improvements in user-friendliness and style
• Improvements in usage opportunities for all

For in-depth discussion of Info-Society issues:
Widening information gaps and policies of prevention, Advice to the Information Society Forum of the European Commission, July 1997, Dr. Jan A.G.M. van Dijk Utrecht University.
Dr. van Dijk's writings will also appear in K. Hacker & J. van Dijk (eds.) Digital Democracy, SAGE 1999, and in the first issue of New Media and Society, April 1999.

For more discussion of the prospects and limitations of the Information Society, click the following:

• Info-City Black Britain
• Digital Cities
• Black Bristolians
• Widening information gaps and policies of prevention
• The One-dimensional Network Society of Manuel Castells