Paye, Moussa2019-09-252019-09-252011-06-192002-05http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.12424/179275"When the State of Senegal acceded to Independence in 1960, it inherited the telecommunication system of the former occupying power. In 1985, the Société nationale des Télécommunications (SONATEL) was created to unify the national and international telecommunications which up until then had been run by TELESENEGAL. The public authorities had understood that the development of this sector would lead to the emergence of an information and communication society based on the new technologies. The government first employed these technologies to gather statistical data for managing public finance, controlling wages, collecting taxes and keeping the population under surveillance. But, as from the second half of the 1990s, it was forced to lift the constraints on the dissemination of information. This process, which led to the freeing up of information from political control by the State, came about quite spontaneously. It brought IT and telecommunication tools together with those of the radio, so that information could be distributed without let or hindrance. This situation, however, which was imposed by circumstances that we shall examine later, did not figure in the plans of the ruling class. So official communication policy remained circumspect. Nevertheless, as from 1994, the emergence of private radio stations invited comparison and, hence, emulation. With the appearance of private FM radio stations using the new information and communication technologies (ICT), freedom of expression took a great leap forward. The public relations company, the press and the documentation services of the ministerial departments - that up until then only used IT for accumulating data - were all undermined. Through the efforts of professionals like journalists who had vowed to struggle for freedom of expression, the democratization of Senegalese society was reinforced. Electoral history shows continual progress towards democracy, in spite of the reticence of those in power. The new ICT devices have played more than one nasty trick on the political actors opposed to honest elections. The Ministry of the Interior was forced to undergo a considerable transformation before organizing transparent, genuine elections in February and March 2000. This influenced the technical and financial procedures in the development of new ICT. It came to be used by the public authorities in collecting public revenue, more rigorous management of civil servants and greater control over waged workers: in short, it contributed to the modernization of the State, which was seen as part of the democratization of society. This study assesses the efforts made by the Administration to adapt to this requirement for free and widespread dissemination of information. Thus we shall see how the need to collect information, promoted by previous policies based on the cult of administrative secrecy, was able to serve a new purpose: giving out information to the largest number of citizens."(pg 4)engWith permission of the license/copyright holderinformation ethicsethics of technologyPoliticsCultural ethicsMedia/communication/information ethicsPreprint