Mobile Communication and Society: A Global Perspective (Information Revolution and Global Politics)

347 Pages·2006·2.25 MB·English

by  Manuel Castells

Mobile Communication and Society
The Information Revolution & Global Politics
William J. Drake & Ernest J. Wilson III, editors
www.mitpress.mit.edu/IRGP-series
The Information Revolution and Developing Countries
Ernest Wilson, 2004
Human Rights in the Global Information Society
edited by Rikke Frank Jørgensen, 2006
Mobile Communication and Society: A Global Perspective
Manuel Castells, Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol, Jack Linchuan Qiu, and Araba Sey, 2007
Mobile Communication and Society
A Global Perspective
Manuel Castells, Mireia Fernández-Ardèvol, Jack Linchuan Qiu,
and Araba Sey
A Project of the Annenberg Research Network on International Communication
The MIT Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England
© 2007 Massachusetts Institute of Technology
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any elec-
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Kong. Printed and bound in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mobile communication and society : a global perspective : a project of the
Annenberg Research Network on international communication / Manuel Castells...
[et al.].
p. cm. – (The information revolution & global politics)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-262-03355-0 (alk. paper)
1. Communication–Social aspects. 2. Mobile communication systems–Social aspects.
3. Information technology–Social aspects. I. Castells, Manuel. II. Series.
HM1206.M62 2006
303.48′33–dc22
2006044970
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents
List of Figures vii
List of Tables ix
Acknowledgments xi
Opening: Our Networks, Our Lives 1
1 The Diffusion of Wireless Communication in the World 7
2 The Social Differentiation of Wireless Communication Users: Age,
Gender, Ethnicity, and Socioeconomic Status 39
3 Communication and Mobility in Everyday Life 77
4 The Mobile Youth Culture 127
5 The Space of Flows, Timeless Time, and Mobile Networks 171
6 The Language of Wireless Communication 179
7 The Mobile Civil Society: Social Movements, Political Power, and
Communication Networks 185
8 Wireless Communication and Global Development: New Issues,
New Strategies 215
Conclusion: The Mobile Network Society 245
Notes 259
References 273
Index 323

List of Figures
1.1 Global diffusion of fixed and mobile telephone lines
1.2 Mobile-phone subscribers per 100 inhabitants: number of countries
in each range, 2003
1.3 Mobile-phone subscribers per 100 inhabitants: world regions,
1992–2004
1.4 Mobile-phone penetration versus GDP per capita (US$), 2002–2003
1.5 Average monthly voice minutes of mobile-phone use in Latin
America, 2000–2003
2.1 Mobile prepaid subscriptions as a percentage of total subscriptions
in selected Latin American countries, 2002
3.1 Household ownership of mobile telephones (% of households) in
selected European countries
3.2 Uses of text messaging (SMS) in China
4.1 Access to mobile telephone by age for selected European countries,
2002
8.1 The growth of Little Smart subscribers in China, 1999–2003 (in
millions)

List of Tables
1.1 Mobile phones per 100 inhabitants by region, 2000–2004
1.2 Cluster analysis of mobile-phone penetration and prepaid sub-
scriptions
2.1 Access to mobile telephones by gender: selected European countries,
2002
2.2 Mobile phone use by gender in the United States, 1993–2000
2.3 Wireless data use by gender in the United States, 2004
2.4 Visits to text-messaging sites by gender in the United States, 2003
2.5 Mobile-phone ownership by ethnic group in the United States,
1999–2004
2.6 Use of mobile phone only, by ethnic group, in the United Kingdom,
2003
3.1 Increase in mobile-phone and fixed-line subscriptions among small
businesses in South Africa and Egypt, 1999–2004
4.1 Wireless service usage by age in the United States, 2001
4.2 SMS revenues in Latin America (US$ millions), 2000–2003
4.3 Uses of cell phones by children 6–14 years in the United States, 2003
5.1 Locations where mobile instant messaging is most frequently used