Manuel Castells

The network society is a society whose social structure is made of networks powered by microelectronics-based information and communication technologies.

Power, in the network society, is not located in institutions, organizations, or even in symbolic repertoires. It is diffused in the networks.

The Internet is not a technology, it is a medium of communication, interaction, and organization.

Identity is people's source of meaning and experience.

The space of flows is the material organization of time-sharing social practices that are not necessarily contiguous.

The self is a project, not a given.

Information technology is not a cause of social change, but a necessary condition for it.

The network society is a global society, but it is not a homogeneous society.

The state is not disappearing, but it is being transformed.

The Internet is a tool, and like any tool, its effects depend on how it is used.

The global economy is an economy whose core activities are organized in real time on a planetary scale.

The crisis of the nation-state is a crisis of legitimacy and effectiveness.

The network is the message.

The information age is not an age of information, but an age of communication.

The individual is not disappearing, but is being reconfigured.

The network is the new social morphology of our societies.

The power of communication is the power to shape the human mind.

The Internet is a cultural form, not just a technological one.

The global city is not a place, but a process.

The self-communication of the network society is a new form of social interaction.