Fifth estate and fifth

power
Removing the quotation
marks

Vasil Penchev
Bulgarian Academy of Sciences:
Institute for the Study of Societies and Knowledge
vasildinev@gmail.com
Digitalization and Social Transformation in the Global World
Bulgaria: Blagoevgrad: South-Western University
29-30 September 2016
(14:00 15:30, 29 September, Room 412, Building 1)

Thesis and commentaries to it

The thesis
The world (wide) web generates a new estate, to
which a huge part of mankind belongs
Unlike the other estates, any human being even a
child of own free will might joint it or not
That amorphous, liquid, non-professional, and
virtual estate is the real power in the world, the
most powerful one
The world web as a power overcomes the classical
three powers and also the so-called fourth one,
media
The trends in favor of it are even stronger than its

A quite short comment of the thesis

The classical three powers, , are concentrated
in the real states and unions
The so-called fourth power (classical media) is
too linked to the former three ones, to national
states and to reality
Both fifth estate and power are
immediately related to information, to Internet
as the mean for its free and unlimited spread
and dissemination, and to its utilization for
more effective organization of life and work

The occasion

The occasion for the present talk

The Fifth Estate is a movie (2013) devoted to
WikiLeaks and Julian Assange, translated in Bulgarian
(The Fifth Power): a metaphor for the
social influence of Internet commensurable and
overcoming that of the traditional three powers and
classical media
This melts the terms estate (Lords spiritual, Lords
temporal, and Commons) and power (legislative,
executive, and judiciary). The media and networks
are called literally estate, but interpreted as power

The fifth power and all rest powers

Furthermore, the term of the fifth power addresses the
research of its specification to the rest powers
The classical three powers, electable in democracy,
coordinate society within the state: legislative power
creates the written framework, which is detailed in two
ways: as instructions and execution by the executive
one, and as the estimation of relevance or irrelevance of
actions to the legislative framework by the judiciary one
The fifth power is unlimited, absolute, but quite rarely
exercised

Media: the fourth power

Media are specifiable as the broker of public opinion
and thus, of direct democracy
While the mandates of the three powers
representatives are a few years, the more and more
dynamical society needs information and feedback to
the powers daily and more often
In fact, media is not standalone as the power: it is
rather a media-tor between people and the classical
powers
Internet can be considered as that kind of medium and
its function are more often restricted just to that

A few features of the fifth power

Internet sites and networks unlike media are featured
by:
Right of initiative and organization (public protests,
etc.)
Information and feedback in real time
Transcending national borders to global ones
Execution of rights by discriminate people: young; in
dictatorship, in traditional or legal restrictions; female;
citizens of any state to events in any stat

The booming power

Key words
estates
Internet web and sites
media
powers
society

Features, mechanism, and trends

of the fifth power

Important features of the fifth power

Being the strongest one, it is quite different from the
classical ones:
No structure, and particularly no centre or hierarchy
It expresses directly peoples will and thus it is the most
efficient and fast form of direct and pure democracy
It is rather restrictive (imposing veto on recent
political decisions) than constructive (elaborating new
ones)
It acts occasionally without any regulation or regularity
in fact realizing improvised referenda

Still more features of the fifth power

It depends directly on technics and the development of
technologies: particularly it appeared at a certain level
of them
The development of technics and technologies amplifies
it: This explains its constant positive trends
It is constantly standby and may be switched on in a
few hours
It is not limited without any national boundaries: It
results in globalisation
It is not restricted in any thematic domains: All able to
excite human beings may provoke its exercise

The mechanism of its action

The web of Internet organizes the global society as
well as any national or regional societies or those in
interests as a single neural network
It transmits constantly different messages between
its members
The transmitted information is almost always too
restricted: Its signal attenuates too fast and locally
Nevertheless, sometimes though exceptionally rarely
it turns to be coherent: The signal of transmitted
information does not attenuate being again and again
retransmitted and unifies a considerable enough part
of society: It begins to be exercised

What is the power of the fifth

power
due to?

There are few reasons for the fifth power to be so strong:

It is always standby and might be activated in a few
hours if need be
It is a direct and pure power of democracy
Its competence is not restricted in any way
It might be manipulated exceptionally difficultly being
without any centres or hierarchy
Anyway it depends crucially on technics and the
development of technologies and might be suppressed
by their control

The classical powers and the new

sovereign
The fifth power takes power from the classical three ones,
first of all, restricting them and repealing decisions
The so-called political class seeks for ways to master it in
order to conserve its privileged power position as peoples
representative
The fifth power is namely direct and thus it does not need
any representatives
The classical powers and their representatives turn out to
be gradually marginalized and restricted to represent only
the most marginal members of society who are out of the
web and its mechanisms

Trends to future
The human progress amplifies and accelerates the transfer
power to it for the progress of technology
That transfer of power to the fifth one grows up
exponentially just as the human knowledge and cognition
themselves
The representative democracy transfers power to the fifth
one rather cleanly and painless
The fifth power is rather international and global than
national
However the undemocratic forms of government seem to be
too unable to that, generating censure and control for the web
or transforming into strange anarchic, fundamentalist and
religious societies and states to prevent the fifth power

Trends in social stratification

A new global social stratum or class though rather
amorphous and uncertain appears distinguishable by
managing their life much more effective by the free
access to relevant information from Internet
The most essential feature of it is not the amount of
wealthy than the ability for it to be managed maximally
effectively by information: e.g. longevity, health and
leisure (free time), creativity in the profession,
information by itself (rather than money) are the main
values
One might liken it as a new global and information
middle class unlike the classical one in 20 th century,

Conclusions

A few main conclusions

Internet generates a new, amorphous and international
estate, a global and information middle class
distinguishable by the crucial utilization of information
from Internet for resolving of all practical problems
much more effectively than by the traditional ways
Being permanently linked to each other in Internet,
the members of that estate are able to exercise direct
democracy in principle similar to neural network
A fifth power appears as a result, the strongest one,
relying on technics and the development of
technologies and absorbing power from the classical
ones

You can find or download the paper

taping the title Fifth estate and fifth
power: removing the quotation
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Thank you very much

for your kind attention!