Informationalism: The technological paradigm that replaced the previous paradigm of industrialism connected to the post world war 2 revolution of computer science, telecommunication and electronics. Informationalism manifests itself in the added importance of knowledge, information and communication.

 

Digitalization: the use of digital technologies to change a business model and provide new revenue and value-producing opportunities; it is the process of moving to a digital business.

 

According to the world economy forum we might see global job losses due to digitalization range from 2 million to 2 billion by 2030. This will also create uncertainty on wages and working conditions. There will also be a decreasing work opportunities for people without higher education.

 

In this essay I invite you to explore the digital underclass with me and how it might look like, who they are, and in the end, what to do about it.

 

Based on earlier statement, education will become even more important in the informationalistic society, something that affect us in our current project here in Barcelona. How can we create the best possible ways of preparing young people for higher education and what should the education system focusing on in order to prepare citizens for this digitized world we are in?

 

Let’s look at gender, we are seeing that women are coping with the fact that education matters more and more better the men. At the Universities there is a majority of females at all institutions except for the engineering ones. The result is that females are gaining more and more top positions in companies, a happy results for many people caring about gender equality.

 

So what kind of competences is valuable in this reality and how will we teach it to our children? Social competence is valued higher and higher due to the need of networking, when to create connections with people and promote yourself. This is a result of a world becoming more and more connected, something also called globalization. Social media has a big part in this, traveling too. It has never before been this easy to travel to the other side of earth or have a friend in South Korea as now. Also here, women are coming out on top with in general 4 times more friends at Facebook than the general male, this as an indication of better social competence skills.

 

We are living in a time where the narcissism is flowing, something you might see if you try to identify the digital underclass and their usage of internet. A confused group (it ranges from today's children to the grandmother that uses facebook to do weird updates) people that never have learned what internet can be and do. We see instagram with its selfies promoting this, - earlier there was myspace, one of the biggest social media platforms where you as an amature could promote your own music. Two huge social media platform that mostly is used for self promotion, - many times out in empty space because no one want to look at all the selfies or food pictures you take or the music you just recorded. And here are the big distinguisher, If used right, as a tool for social connection and promotion of quality, they will last and become powerful, if not they will lead to even more self promotion, - screaming out into empty air hoping for someone to care about just me.

 

So we live in a time of narcissism, and a decrease in men applying to universities. In order to continue this exploration of what you could call the digital underclass, let us look back at the the men that does not go to further education and their digital habits.

 

Many times these men stay where they grew up while the females move into the city in order to seek education or work. These men and their Internet consumption is many times based on pornografy and forums where they can meet other people with same situation and worldview. These people might not see a bright future due to jobs that earlier were there to catch them, like the industry or army, is no longer in place. And the politicians are not talking about them, this rising underclass, both economical and digital. It is also the result of a secular world so drained of other meaning than work that if you loose that, - your are doomed.

 

We can see this now in the so-called “fly over states” in USA, the states that has the highest following of Donald Trump, small town communities with mainly male inhabitants. The women have moved, the factory has closed and there is few friends other than the social connections online that unify them all around the same thing, hate. This can be seen in Europe too, with the rise of right wing parties in most countries, an EU that is unstable after both economical collapse and Brexit.

 

Some people could call this for a growing ground for chaos or conflict, - some people might even say that we already live in it and that the future does not look bright.

 

In times of chaos or possible chaos mankind has always looked for clear leadership, someone or something that can paint a picture of a possible better future, someone with a vision. Moses might be one of the clearest examples of this when he lead the Israelites out of Egypt through the red sea, - let's talk about vision. Today's politicians are not giving us this, they fight in television and journalists reveal private tragedies, they become our reality tv stars with their faces on the front side of every newspaper. The clearest example might be the tv start sitting as president of the united states of America.

 

Many statements has been said, many times referred to the Swedish digital philosopher Alexander Bard as source,the scope has also been limited. So now in the end we are asking ourselves, - how shall we take this into account when designing the curriculum of the future?

 

How to see soft values such as social competence, network building, flexibility and critical thinking as necessary in the future? In a time with exponential development of technology, how will we teach kids digital presence and navigation in the chaos of information? How will the teachers keep up? Might it be so that giving more responsibility back to the kids will help them develop these skills? That if they learn how to explain things to their fellow friend, how they can lift people around them that does not have the same capability as yourself, they will grow?

 

The questions are still many and we keep on looking for some sort of solution.