Economic Consequences of Microelectronic and Telecom Revolution

The microelectronic and telecommunications explosion has changed the nature of markets and structure of firms, created new avenues of social mobility while rendering obsolete old skills, jobs and capital. By minimising transport cost it has reinforced the importance of economic principles like comparative advantage. One cannot, however, speak with the same assurance of the continued relevance of classical political theory: the new communications technology has fused and confused the realms of the local and the global and created virtual domains of globality with major implications for sovereignty and the nation state.