Capturing the Information City: The Liberation of Spatial Technology in Taiwan, 1994–2008

Kuan-Chi Wang

Abstract


Since the 1990s, building the “information city” has emerged as an important issue in urban development. This phenomenon began in the United States and Europe, and since then such development has been pursued in countries in the Asia-Pacific region. To examine the idea of the emerging information city in Taiwan, this study examines the decentralization of territory and information technology in this nation from 1994 to 2008. The spatiality of techno-infrastructure in Taiwan has long been controlled by the central government, yet this spatial structure encountered a transformation in the mid-1990s. The most significant changes have included the rising influence of urbanization and Internet-related infrastructures. Also important are the political strategies of the Taiwan government in terms of neoliberalization in the telecommunications industry and the reconfiguration of Taiwan’s political economy in the past two decades.

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