The Information Society: Emerging Landscapes IFIP International Conference on Landscapes of ICT and Social Accountability, Turku, Finland, June 27-29, 2005

In 1990, members of IFIP Working Group 9.2 were instrumental in producing one of the first books to describe the ‘Landscape’ of the new phenomena created by the uptake of computerization – the so-called Information Society. Ten years later, at the annual Namur meeting of its Working Group in January 2000, a proposal was made to produce a second book and the brainstorming began. In the time that had passed, the developments in computer technology had brought the Internet within reach of ordinary citizens, and the World Wide Web had spawned a new ‘e-industry’. The landscape of the information society had changed dramatically, and it continues to change at a breathtaking pace.

This book is the result of those discussions, culminating with the "Landscapes" Conference held at Turku University, Finland, in July 2005. The themes chosen for the conference – philosophy, ethics and sociological aspects, culture and education; social aspects; politics and regulation; economics and work; technology and emerging technologies – represent many of the perspectives from which to view this landscape. The papers illustrate the diverse impacts of the information society and the changing paradigms within education, law, health care, the workplace and on future societal infrastructures through research initiatives and the development of new technologies. In this book, IFIP WG9.2 has attempted to capture the new ‘emerging landscape’ of the Information Society.

A picture of profound technological and social change emerges from this holistic approach. It offers a key to understanding the ramifications of computer technologies within the information society, and of the social accountability of all those who work with and are affected by them.