3.1C: Advances in Communication Technology
The 21st Century is dominated by rapid development in ICT and mobile communications, (mobile phones, internet, social networking, economic banking, fibre optics), lowering communication costs and contributing to space-time compression.
Rapid Development in ICT and Mobile Communication
ICT (Information Communication Technology) developments have reduced communication costs and increased global communication flows, since the late 20th century.
Little changed between the adoption of the electric telegraph and the growth of the landline telephone after 1900, but developments have been very rapid since 1990.
Many activities are now done without any personal interaction - banking (electronic apps), booking hotels (online) and increasingly shopping.
Mobile Phones
Internet
Social Networks
Economic Banking
Fibre-optic cables
Little changed between the adoption of the electric telegraph and the growth of the landline telephone after 1900, but developments have been very rapid since 1990.
Many activities are now done without any personal interaction - banking (electronic apps), booking hotels (online) and increasingly shopping.
Mobile Phones
- These have become common since their invention in the mid-1990s, even in many developing countries.
- With smart phones, smart tablets and smart watches in the 2000s extended they information flows to locations beyond landline networks.
- Reduced mobile phone costs expanded usage from an expensive business tool to an ubiquitous consumer product.
- Used even in countries with a lack of communications infrastructure. By 2015, 70% of people in Africa owned a mobile phone.
- With smart phones, smart tablets and smart watches in the 2000s extended they information flows to locations beyond landline networks.
Internet
- Internet access became common from the mid 1990s, followed by fast broadband.
- Close to 50% of the world's population uses internet.
- Broadband internet in the 1980s and 90s meant that large amounts of data could be moved quickly through cyberspace.
Social Networks
- Social networks and Skype allow people to communicate instantly and without charge (with an internet connection). In 2014, 5 billion Facebook 'likes' were registered each day.
- The development of social media (Facebook 2006, Instagram 2010, WhatsApp 2010) enabled much cheaper communication between friends and family than landline telephone.
- This has led to space-time compression, where the cost (time or money) of communicating over distance has fallen rapidly, so people can communicate regardless of distance.
- Since 2003 Skype has allowed cheap, direct, face-to-face communication, allowing migrants to maintain stronger bonds with their distant family.
Economic Banking
- The rise of mobile phones means they can be used for economic banking, revolutionising life for individuals and businesses. In Kenya:
- The equivalent of one third of the country's GDP is sent through the M-Pesa system annually. This is a mobile phone service that allows credit to be directly transferred between phone users.
- People in towns and cities use mobiles to make payments for utility bills and school fees.
- In rural areas, fishermen and farmers use mobiles to check market prices before selling produce.
- Women in rural areas can secure micro-loans, using their M-Pesa bills as proof they have a good credit record.
- Electronic banking extends capital flows beyond the physical banking network
- In-store barcode recording automatically orders a replacement from a distant supplier, reducing warehouse and wasted transport costs. .
- E-banking allows migrants to transmit remittances of money back to their home countries.
- It has been a huge benefit to businesses, since they can:
- Keep in touch with all parts of their production, supply and sales network, locally and globally.
- Transfer money and investments instantly.
- Instantly analyse data on sales, employees and orders from anywhere within their business.
Fibre-optic cables
- Land-based and sub-sea fibre optic cables in the 2000s increased the speed and volume of data transmission through cyberspace, and allow instant, global communications.
- More than 1 million kilometres of flexible undersea cables carry the world's data.
- Global positioning systems (GPS) use continuously broadcasting satellites as beacons to triangulate information.
- Delivery vehicles can continuously locate and transmit their position whilst satellite navigation (SATNAV) systems reduce costs from vehicles getting lost.
- Satellite-based television has meant that popular channels are available worldwide, in many languages.
- Electronic banking extends capital flows beyond the physical banking network
Additional Class Notes
Other ways that ICT developments can lead to globalisation:
Cultural Globalisation
Political Globalisation
Economic Effects of Globalisation:
Commodities: Undifferentiated primary products bought in bulk, e.g. wheat, iron ore. They are usually used as raw materials in the manufacturing process.
Capital: May refer to money (financial capital) or things used to make other things, e.g. machinery, factories (physical capital) or improvements in workers' productivity capital, e.g. through education, training and health (human capital).
Resilience: The ability to rapidly regain normal state following an adverse change.
Cultural Globalisation
- Cassette recorders, MP3 players and iPhones enable a rapid global transfer of music and video.
- e.g. South Korean K-pop and Psy's 1.8 billion online views of 'Gangnam Style' in 2012
- TNCs bring foreign styles and products, e.g. McDonalds, Starbucks, possibly creating a global 'McCulture'?
Political Globalisation
- Social networks can be used to spread political messages, e.g. an environmental campaign or enhanced impact of a terrorist atrocity.
Economic Effects of Globalisation:
- Globalisation allows economic specialisation where the country focusses on production of certain goods/services it can produce most efficiently, lowering production costs.
- The focus of specialisation determined by the country's mix of natural resources (land). people (labour) and technology (capital)
- Specialisation and trade allows for an increase in global output and increases choice, raising quality of life.
- Globalisation reduces self-sufficiency and increases interdependence - mutual reliance on inputs from other countries.
- Increased complexity of global flows may reduce resilience as it increases vulnerability to shocks anywhere in the world, e.g. a natural disaster, economic recession, war, or political conflict.
Commodities: Undifferentiated primary products bought in bulk, e.g. wheat, iron ore. They are usually used as raw materials in the manufacturing process.
Capital: May refer to money (financial capital) or things used to make other things, e.g. machinery, factories (physical capital) or improvements in workers' productivity capital, e.g. through education, training and health (human capital).
Resilience: The ability to rapidly regain normal state following an adverse change.