The i-sation of society and post-secularism: towards new inequalities?

In Jameson's classic work, the end of the 20th century was claimed to face the third phase of capitalism, that of late capitalism, the world space of multinational capital. Around the same time, Ritzer wrote about the McDonaldisation of Society which refers to the permeability of (what Weber made reference to as) rational bureaucracy into our everyday life. This paper will argue that we are now in a fourth stage of capitalism, the cyber space of 'denationalised' capitalism, and that with the help of new i-technologies, this penetration of rational bureaucracy has filtered further from everyday life to our personal biographies. Linking these two theories, this paper will present the argument that we are going through a process of i-sation of society (1) in which capitalism is not only dominating our outer life (e.g. global capitalism) but our inner life as well through its expansion on the Internet facilitated by various i-technological applications and (2) in which the McDonaldisation process has now been normalised and religion has been standardised. This paper will address the new inequalities at hand in this i-society, its impact on Habermas' project of post-secularism, and will project the role that various religions will have in supporting and/or countering this process.