A major international debate has been going on in recent years on the way the world informs itself about itself. For Anthony Smith, a hardened observer of the international media scene, the division between rich and poor nations of the world in the matter of information has reached a point of crisis. His book sets out to describe how this crisis has come about and to identify possible areas of agreement between those who defend the existing world information network as the most efficient and libertarian way of organizing the flow of news and data, and those who see it as an imperialistic system designed to perpetuate the post-colonial subjection of developing nations to an alien Western culture.

Mr Smith manages to end his brief survey on a reasonably up-beat note. Looking to the electronic revolution in communications which is already with us, he expresses the belief that ‘ it must surely be within the power of governments and in the long-term interests of corporations to see that