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38 Manuel Castellsspace of flows, based on instrumentality, in the process that I label as the“grassrooting” of the space of flows. Indeed, the space of flows does not disappear,since it is the spatial form of the network society, but its logic can betransformed. Instead of enclosing meaning and function in the programs of thenetworks, it could provide material support for the global connection of localexperience.Space and time are redefined at the same time by the emer<strong>ge</strong>nce of a newsocial structure and by the struggles over the shape and programs of this socialstructure. In a sense, space and time express the culture(s) of the network society.Culture in the Network SocietyAll societies are cultural constructs, if we understand culture as the set ofvalues and beliefs that inform and motivate people’s behavior. So, if there is aspecific network society, we should be able to identify the culture of thenetwork society as its historical marker. Here again, however, the complexityand novelty of the network society sug<strong>ge</strong>st caution. First of all, because thenetwork society is global, it works with and integrates a multiplicity ofcultures, linked to the history and <strong>ge</strong>ography of each area of the world. In fact,industrialism, and the culture of the industrial society, did not make culturesdisappear around the world. The industrial society had many different, andindeed contradictory, manifestations (from the United States to the SovietUnion, and from Japan to the United Kingdom). There were also industrializedcores in otherwise lar<strong>ge</strong>ly rural and traditional societies. Not even capitalismunified its realm of historical existence culturally. Yes, the market ruled inevery capitalist country, but under such specific rules, and with such a varietyof cultural forms, that identifying a culture as capitalist is of little analyticalhelp, unless we actually mean by that American or Western culture: it thenbecomes empirically wrong.So, in the same way, the network society develops in a multiplicity ofcultural settings, produced by the differential history of each context. It materializesin specific forms, leading to the formation of highly diverse institutionalsystems, as the studies presented in this volume demonstrate. There isstill a common core to the network society, as there was to industrial society,but there is an additional layer of unity in the network society. It exists globallyin real time. It is global in its structure. Thus, not only does it deploy itslogic in the whole world, but it keeps its networked organization at the globallevel at the same time as it makes itself specific in every society.This double movement of commonality and singularity has two mainconsequences at the cultural level. On the one hand, specific cultural identitiesbecome the trenches of autonomy, and sometimes of resistance, for collectives

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