Digitalization of Television in Japan: State, Economy, and Discourse

JungBong Choi characterizes Japan''s introduction of digital broadcasting as a political, cultural and economic endeavor orchestrated by the Japanese state and other para-state institutions. In so doing the author employs a concept of "digitalization," as opposed to “digitization,” defined as a social, institutional, and discursive making of digital television. With the analytic framework established, the author observes howthe identity of television in Japan was renewed as an apparatus conducive to the acceleration of an informational capitalism. An innovative study in the political economy of media, the book brings to light ways in which digital technologies are engineered as a key device for socio-economic reordering. A stimulating appraisal of the contemorary state, furthermore, it offers a perspective on the progressive conflation between state and market, technology and institution, and cultural discourse and economic planning.

JungBong Choi is currently Assistant Professor in the Department of Cinema Studies at NYU. His research interests include digital technologies, theories of globalization, and East Asian culture with emphasis on films/media of Japan and Korea.