Knowledge Society as a Space for the Transformation of Human Being: A Philosophical Analysis of Social Reality
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.48010/hetc9j42Keywords:
Knowledge Society, Information Society, Digital Society, Human Existence, Digital Mediation, Digital Representation, Social Construction of RealityAbstract
The article examines the tension between expanding opportunities for autonomous human activity in a knowledge society and the dependence of social position on digital representation and evaluation. The study aims to explain how digital mediation changes the conditions of activity, social presence, and self-determination. Its methodology combines conceptual analysis, a comparative examination of theories of the knowledge society and the social construction of reality, and an analytical reconstruction of how digital representations influence social practices.
Human existence is defined as a socially situated mode of being in which people act, interpret their experiences, relate to others, and determine their future possibilities. The information society, digital society, and knowledge society are distinguished as analytical descriptions of information processes, technological mediation, and the social conditions of knowledge production and acquisition. The contribution consists in specifying when a digital representation acquires a constitutive function and in relating these conditions to three dimensions of human existence. The decisive transition occurs when an evaluation informs decisions that alter a person's social opportunities. Feedback into behaviour can reproduce this mechanism.
The analysis identifies tensions between access to information and independent judgement, networked presence and recognition of experience, and lifelong learning and conformity to indicators. It argues that preserving agency requires opportunities to explain one's position, contest evaluations, and participate in shaping the rules of digital interaction. The study is theoretical, and the proposed mechanism requires further empirical investigation.
References
1 Alekseeva, I. Ju. (2009). Chto takoe obshchestvo znanij? [What Is a Knowledge Society?]. Kogito-Centr. (In Russian)
2 Drucker, P. (1999). Postkapitalisticheskoe obshchestvo [Post-Capitalist Society]. In V. L. Inozemcev (Ed.), Novaja postindustrial’naja volna na Zapade: Antologija (pp. 70–100). Academia. (In Russian)
3 Bell, D. (1999). Gryadushchee postindustrial’noe obshchestvo: Opyt social’nogo prognozirovanija [The Coming of Post-Industrial Society: A Venture in Social Forecasting] (Trans. from English). Academia. (In Russian)
4 K obshchestvam znanija: Vsemirnyj doklad JuNESKO [Towards Knowledge Societies: UNESCO World Report]. (2005). Izdatel’stvo JuNESKO. (In Russian)
5 Kazahstan na puti postroenija obshchestva znanija (filosofskoe issledovanie): Kollektivnaja monografija [Kazakhstan on the Path to Building a Knowledge Society: A Philosophical Study, Collective Monograph] (A. H. Bizhanov, Ed.). (2017). Institut filosofii, politologii i religiovedenija KN MON RK. (In Russian)
6 Machlup, F. (1972). The production and distribution of knowledge in the United States. Princeton University Press.
7 Karpov, A. O. (2015). Osnovnye teoreticheskie ponjatija obshchestva znanij [Basic Theoretical Concepts of the Knowledge Society]. Vestnik Rossijskoj akademii nauk, 85(9), 812–820. https://doi.org/10.7868/S0869587315090054 (In Russian)
8 Shamardin, N. N. (2015). «Obshchestvo znanij»: Filosofsko-metodologicheskaja kritika ponjatija [“Knowledge Society”: A Philosophical and Methodological Critique of the Concept]. Nauchnye vedomosti Belgorodskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Serija: Filosofija. Sociologija. Pravo, (14), 185–192. (In Russian)
9 Orlov, M. I. (2011). Ot informacionnogo obshchestva k obshchestvu znanij: Konceptualizacija novoj paradigmy civilizacionnogo razvitija [From the Information Society to the Knowledge Society: Conceptualizing a New Paradigm of Civilizational Development]. Vestnik Saratovskogo gosudarstvennogo tehnicheskogo universiteta, (2), 236–244. (In Russian)
10 Orlov, M. I. (2011). Obshchestvo znanij kak novaja paradigma civilizacionnogo razvitija [The Knowledge Society as a New Paradigm of Civilizational Development] [Candidate of Philosophical Sciences dissertation, specialty 09.00.11—Social Philosophy]. (In Russian)
11 Jamanbalayeva, S., Burova, E., Sagikyzy, A., Zhanabayeva, D., & Adamidi, A. (2025). The paradigm of the digital society: Synthesis of technocratic and socio-humanitarian approaches. Cogent Social Sciences, 11(1), Article 2513460. https://doi.org/10.1080/23311886.2025.2513460
12 Izzetova, E. M., & Li, Y. V. (2023). The philosophical analysis of information and digital technologies as factors of transformation of social reality. International Journal of Multicultural and Multireligious Understanding, 10(11), 206–210. https://doi.org/10.18415/ijmmu.v10i11.5336
13 Kastel’s, M. (2000). Informacionnaja jepoha: Jekonomika, obshchestvo i kul’tura [The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture] (B. Je. Verhopol’skij, D. A. Tishchenko, & A. N. Subochev, Trans.). GU VShJe. (In Russian)
14 Berger, P., & Lukman, T. (1995). Social’noe konstruirovanie real’nosti: Traktat po sociologii znanija [The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge] (E. D. Rutkevich, Trans.). Medium. (In Russian)
15 Gillespie, T. (2014). The relevance of algorithms. In T. Gillespie, P. J. Boczkowski, & K. A. Foot (Eds.), Media technologies: Essays on communication, materiality, and society (pp. 167–194). MIT Press. https://doi.org/10.7551/mitpress/9780262525374.003.0009
16 Espeland, W. N., & Sauder, M. (2007). Rankings and reactivity: How public measures recreate social worlds. American Journal of Sociology, 113(1), 1–40. https://doi.org/10.1086/517897
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2026 Гульбарам Кульжанова, Жулдизай Кульжанова, Евгения Пенионжек
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.