Information and Communication in Economics

Book excerpt: 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.