A Comparative Study on the Impact of Cyberspace on Values (With Emphasis on the Islamic Heritage)

The increasing development of information and communication technologies and the formation of "networked society" led to the transformation of cultural values in contemporary societies that the most obvious example is the growth of secular-rational values and the values of self-expression or liberating. This study wants to investigate this process and by that analyze the effect of traditional heritage and cultural values in relation to cyberspace in some Islamic countries. This theoretical study shows that there are different theoretical perspectives in relation to cyberspace and cultural values: First, those are believe that entering technology led to disappeared of tradition values and emerge of new values. This is a unite process in the world. The second group emphasize on the importance of cultural values in different societies and resistance and even intensification. The third groups believe that the increasing developments in globalization and communication technology we witness combining traditional and modern values in modern society. A recent theory called the "firewalls" emphasis on the importance of economic and cultural barriers to change and replace the values. Accordingly, based on the theory firewalls, changes in Iran society in comparison with the rest of society shows that such barriers in cyberspace has prominent impact on changes in the value of Iran's society. Method of this study is a secondary analysis using data from the World Values Survey for Islamic countries.