We're inclined to assume that digital technologies have suddenly revolutionized everything in
just a few years including our relationships our forms of work and leisure and even our
democracies. Armin Nassehi puts forward a new theory of digital society which turns this
assumption on its head. Rather than treating digital technologies as an independent causal
force that is transforming social life he asks: for which problem is digitization a solution?
When we pose the question in this way we can see argues Nassehi that digitization helps
societies deal with and reduce complexity by using coded numbers to process information about
society. We can also see that modern societies already had a digital structure long before
modern computer technologies were developed - already in the nineteenth century for example
statistical pattern recognition technologies were being used in functionally differentiated
societies in order to recognize monitor and control forms of human behaviour. Digital
technologies were so successful in such a short period of time and were able to penetrate so
many areas of society so quickly precisely because of a pre-existing sensitivity that prepared
modern societies for digital development. This highly original book lays the foundations for a
theory of digital society that will be of value to everyone interested in the growing presence
of digital technologies in our lives.
