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Communications of the IIMA

Abstract

One of the most pressing questions that governments and societies have to answer is how to develop the infrastructure of the expected information society. In this paper I will take a look at two archetypical positions: at a state-oriented and a market-oriented view. I will recount the arguments for both sides in order to then demonstrate that all of these arguments are in fact derivatives of the older discussion about state versus market that has been with us at least since Marx. I will then try to show that these arguments are based on metaphysical assumptions about the nature of markets which are not subject to empirical investigation or other means of generally recognised clarification. The paper therefore aims to show that the debate cannot be expected to ever lead to a consensus. If this is true then we have to consider ways of structuring the debate in a way that will make the results acceptable to the affected parties without being able to rely on a shared metaphysical view of problem.

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