Information and Communication in Economics / Edition 1

by Robert E. Babe

Overview

Although there is a burgeoning interest among economists in ‘information economics', much of the literature adopts a reductionist conceptualization of information, defining it exclusively as reduction in uncertainty, exploring the implications of imperfect information on markets. This neoclassical treatment obscures major interrelations between economic and communicatory processes.
Drawing on a range of distinguished scholarship from both the economic and communication studies disciplines, Information and Communication in Economics explores the implications for economic analysis and our understanding of economic processes of employing a more complete conceptualization of information: information as locus of power; information as evolutionary agent; and media systems as devices for control.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780792393580
Publisher:	Springer Netherlands
Publication date:	11/30/1993
Series:	Recent Economic Thought , #32
Edition description:	1994
Pages:	347
Product dimensions:	6.10(w) x 9.25(h) x 0.24(d)

Table of Contents

1 The Information Economy Revisited.- Commentary by Gilles Paquet.- 2 The Place of Information in Economics.- 3 Commodities as Sign-systems.- Commentary by Sandra Braman.- 4 The Political Economy of Communication: Lessons from the Founders.- 5 Economic Theory: Rhetoric, Reality, Rationalization.- Commentary by Herbert I. Schiller.- 6 The Political Economy of Communications Research.- 7 All the Editorials Fit to Print: The Politics of “Newsworthiness”.- Commentary by Gertrude J. Robinson.- Reply by Edward S. Herman.- 8 The Information Economy in a Spatial Context: City-states in a Global Village.- Commentary by Nicholas Garnham.- 9 The Emerging Mass Media Environment.- Commentary by Gilles Paquet.- Commentary by Nicholas Garnham.- 10 Application of Neoclassical Economics to African Development: a Curse in Disguise.- 11 Communication, Information, and Transnational Enterprise.- 12 Communications and Economics.

Editorial Reviews

Draws on a wide range of scholarship from both the economic and communication studies disciplines to explore the implications for economic analysis and the understanding of economic processes of employing a more complete conceptualization of information: information as locus of power; information as evolutionary agent; and media systems as devices for control. In the volume's introductory chapter, D.McL. Lamberton, an early pioneer in the field of information economics, surveys the historical development and present status of orthodox economics' treatments of information/communication. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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