Digitalization of Society and Socio-political Issues 1

IntroductionAbout the Digitalization of Society

Not everything that can be counted counts… and not everything that counts can be counted.

William Bruce Cameron

What does digital mean? The question was asked on May 2, 3 and 4, 2018, at an international conference organized in Montreal by the Centre de recherche interuniversitaire sur la communication, l’information et la société (CRICIS). Under the title “Numérisation généralisée de la société: acteurs, discours, pratiques et enjeux” (Widespread Digitalization of Society: Actors, Discourses, Practices and Challenges), it brought together some 100 researchers who have devoted their thoughts to the theme of the digitalization of our societies, the discourse and social practices surrounding it, the actors who mobilize it, and the challenges that it brings to communicational, informational and cultural issues. This two-volume publication is a follow-up to this event. However, these are not conference proceedings for three reasons. First, this publication brings together the texts of about a third of the people who were present during these three days. Second, a significant number of proposals were rejected, and, for the other selected texts, significant editorial work was carried out. Third, some of the texts in this publication are from people whose contributions to the conference had been accepted but who were unable to attend. This opus is the result of this work.

The term digital is now present everywhere and applies to almost ...