The Politics of Global Communications Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

The Politics of Global Communications - Essay Example Globalization of communication dates back to the 1920s where initially it was spurred by international trade, expansion of media companies as well as colonialism. Politics in this era were characterized by the official opening of the US global communication policy. As noted by Kamalipour', ), information and communication technologies such as internet, mobile phones, satellite radio and television are used by political power houses to meet their propaganda all over the world. Global communication has changed the way politics are done by encouraging revolutionalization, for instance in global economy and ecology .Globalization allows politics to take a vast growth worldwide through non-governmental organizations, other integrated schemes and also through global movements. Of the most important technology in politics is telecommunication which is a process through which information is transferred. Telecommunication gives people options, especially to chose the ideologies to buy and the ones to discard (Kamalipour, 2002).Global communication has a great positive impact on politics because it helps in spreading politics across boarders through its' instruments such as radios, televisions, telegraphs among others. These can generally be termed as political instruments. Kamalipour (2002), highlights the political aspects of communication as vital in the global politics. Politics of global communication have contributed to the deterioration of diplomacy and often are responsible for many wars fought. Taking the example of the First World War; communication in form of wide coverage of radio, as well as heightened and increased public awareness something which resulted into public pressure on governments, coalitions. With the media reaching more people than ever before, and the general public turning into media for news on progress of wars, the way they perceive the outcome of war usually has a meaningful bearing in the destiny of whole societies. All the above results in the political interest of by the political elites in controlling flow of news. With ICT now virtually under control of political leaders the issue of security in regard to telecommunications, results into the design of communications strategy, communications intelligence, and cryptography which are important and decisive tools in times of war. This was evident as early as during the first and second World Wars. Since technological advancements have increased the speed of communications between nations of the world, this has had an effect of increased importance to governments. The fact that knowledge is power means that, always, governments seek to capitalize on the improved speed and availability of communications, basically to advance their control of power as well as to influence of their political adversaries. Therefore emergence of new trends which influence the political aspects of the not so new concept of global communications network in the period preceding the twentieth century is to blame for many wars fought in the 19th century. When critically examined, the evolution of technology resulted into fast and reliable communication over long distances in the form of electric telegraph in the late 19th century and internet in the 21st century. Although having internal networks is viable and less risky, network communications