Page 39 - Communication Commerce and Power The Political Economy of America and the Direct Broadcast Satellite

US Foreign Communication Policy 27

Far from being unimportant, the information-knowledge distinc-
tion, its theorization and subsequent application to critical analyses
are crucial. Aspects of Cox's work complement this perspective. Since
the 1980s, the American state has been restructured in ways that have
prioritized international developments in the free flow of information
mostly through trade-related institutions. In keeping with Cox's crit-
ical approach, the complex forces at work have involved and reflected
a realignment of dominant class relationships. While production and
class relations are central, 'other factors enter into the formation or
nonformation of real historical classes.' These, Cox explains, include
'agencies of collective action that can evoke and channel class con-
sciousness.'27 Capital-labour relations are understood by Cox to be
dynamic and directly conditioned by the organizations and institu-
tions that mediate them. These mediations directly influence the
intellectual capacities of human agents. To some extent, the wide-
spread establishment of such relations over time constitute historical
structures, consecrating dominant structural forms both institution-
ally and ideologically. It is through the success of America's free-trade
victory in the Uruguay Round of GATT and the subsequent
growth and intensification of information and communication com-
modity activities that the media of hegemonic power - from private
sector service corporations to international organizations and institu-
tions - are now implicitly and explicitly reshaping (but not determin-
ing) the ways in which much of the world thinks about capitalism
and the role of transnational communication and information
developments.
It is on this point that Strange's dismissal of the importance of the
information-knowledge relationship and Cox's under-theorisation of
his category of ideas must be redressed.
An individual's knowledge of his or her life and world can be
represented as a complex set of conceptual systems constantly applied
to the ongoing tasks of perceiving and interpreting. These conceptual
systems are not only used to mediate reality, they are also subjected to
continual reaffirmations or modifications in accordance with indi-
vidual experiences. Information flows, in whatever form, thus are
continually subjected to interpretation. Simply put, culture provides
the individual and the collectivity with a social-environmental refer-
ence point or social compass on which conceptual systems can be used
or modified to interpret information. 28
To some degree, technologies, organizations and institutions repre-
sent reifications of complex social constructions. They play a