Introduction
“Digital exclusion mirrors poverty, illiteracy, limited electricity access, lack of digital skills, and inadequate content in local languages …” (Zhao, 2022, p. 3). So wrote the Secretary-General of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) at the beginning of 2022. Indeed, digital exclusion and the persistence of digital divides, either within or between nation-states, can be indicative of other development gaps, such as income levels, education levels, access to medical care, food security/vulnerability, and availability of utilities such as electricity and water. These examples, all relate to differences in the standard of living between wealthy people, regions and states compared to those with little wealth, or differences between the rich and poor, including between high-income countries and low-income countries.
Reducing digital exclusion and digital divides for disadvantaged communities necessarily requires access to and use of information and communication technologies (ICTs) and the Internet. Though, how these are provided and the way they are capable of being uniquely and appropriately used in relation to a particular community requires consideration. This is because, as Sen (Sen, 1989; Wells, n.d.) notes (Naha, 2016), there are differences between individuals, and so also between communities, in the “ability to transform resources” (Sen, 1999), such as ICTs and Internet access, into “valuable activities” (Sen, 1999).
Furthermore, the results of activities need to sustain a community going forward. In addition, ICTs and Internet access will have to assist in ensuring sustainability of a community’s resources, while improving its standard of living, consistently with (Wu et. al., 2018) the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) set by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) (UN, n.d.; UNGA, 2015). This would be ideal for community development and empowerment. However, it is possible for ICTs and Internet access to have negative consequences for developing communities. This essay gives some examples. Even if this is so, regulatory regimes may be able to deal with these issues, so that ICTs and Internet access should still be pursued within a development agenda. This essay will also give examples of why and how they assist in the provision of basic necessities for developing communities, such as food, water, medical care and reliable electricity, to name but a few.
ICTs and Internet access – development and empowerment
Use of ICTs and their software can positively contribute to community development by stimulating social, cultural, economic, political and other civil interactions among people, as well as their enterprises and organizations. To do this effectively, they should enable expressions in the people’s local languages and scripts, or those they use every day, and in ways appealing to their community. In this way, people will have greater capability to do things using the technologies.
This, however, requires encouraging a neo-techno community interest in technology development programs and projects seen to support community activities and empower communities. A similar neo-techno nationalist (Shim & Shin, 2015) sentiment has been successfully evoked in China, leading to the Chinese manufacturing of ICT devices (e.g. by Huawei and Lenovo) to help industrialize the country and thereby reduce poverty. China has also developed distinctly Chinese social media platforms (e.g. WeChat and Weibo) for communicating across Chinese communities.
Establishing Internet access for communicating across a community, and obtaining online information, in technologically non-developed areas is essential. This can be provided by various commercial and/or non-commercial systems. Local enterprises, such as regional wireless internet service providers (WISPs) can provide access, once personnel are trained, or it may be more efficient to use national carriers or global satellite operators. Regard should be had to both terrestrial (land, water, air) and satellite (outer space) systems. The choice may well depend on geographic factors.
Whatever the case, for communities that are at a technological disadvantage, capacity development programs and projects need to be tailored to meet their needs, considering their differences. This does not imply that the simplest systems should be used, especially if more complex systems can provide greater benefits and adaptation by people in the community is feasible. For example, Internet access involving OneWeb’s low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites may be the most advantageous solution for certain remote communities (OneWeb 2022a; OneWeb 2022b, OneWeb 2022c).
ICTs and Internet access – negative consequences for developing communities
Growth in use of ICTs and Internet access in a developing area ordinarily requires an increase in the skills base for the provision of goods and services emanating from these recently established sectors of the economy. Approximately three billion people around the world still do not have access to the Internet (ITU, 2021a; AG-P, 2021), most of them reside in developing countries (ITU, 2021b, p. 1). Regular use of ICTs by them is also likely to be much less. When ICTs and Internet access are introduced to developing parts of the world, uptake is dependent on people gaining digital skills. As well, job training or retraining is required.
Large-scale introduction of ICTs and Internet access could cause disruptions in local or national labour markets (World Bank, 2016, p. 132). This can affect people in communities who are reliant on routine manual labour or routine cognitive labour (World Bank, 2016, p. 132) for their livelihood. Their manual labour may now be seen as having less value. The same applies to people using traditional cognitive labour, such as that involved in processing exchanges of goods and services, e.g. keeping accounts and other records on paper. If the labour market turns in favour of new computer skills, there could be a reduction in employment opportunities for people reliant on traditional manual labour (due to devaluation of their work) or routine cognitive labour (which can be computerised). Their earnings may remain static or decrease. Older generations may be particularly affected.
These factors need to be considered as developing economies become more digital. Other implications are: skill obsolescence (World Bank, 2016, p. 132) and decrease in productivity in parts of the economy that are low earning, e.g. agriculture (World Bank, 2016, p. 132) which then affects food security; creation of inequalities in developing communities as opportunities regarding use of ICTs and Internet access are seized in different ways (World Bank, 2016, p. 132); and impacts on the local governance of a community. Underinvestment in cybersecurity can also lead to compromise of people’s personal data (World Bank, 2021, p. 37), which will have negative implications for a developing community.
In Sen’s terms (1999) will people, through ICTS and Internet access, be enabled to reach higher levels of ability? In this regard, there is also a corporate social responsibility to support digitally marginalized people (Capgemini, 2020) by way of digital literacy programs and skills development (ITU, 2021b, p. 19). Otherwise, developing areas of the world that introduce ICTs and Internet access as grand solutions to their development needs could well face “runaway digital capitalism” (Gurumurthy, 2016). This would reduce meaningful participation in the local economy. Concentration of economic power would then be an obstacle to development (UN, 1990, p. 44).
ICTs and Internet access – improving living standards
Pragmatically though, these kinds of negative implications may just be short-term, and in the long-term big digital development goals will turn out as worthwhile for developing communities. ICTs and Internet access have already altered interactions within and between many communities around the world, and will likely reconstitute developing communities that do not yet have these technologies on a large scale, when they do attain them on a sufficient scale. They can be instrumental in the quest for equality of opportunity of people, whereas lack of Internet access (and the ICTs required for it) is especially problematic today because it is now widely considered to be a key driver of inequality (Oghia, 2017).
The arguments for less emphasis being placed on ICTs and Internet access when it comes to development are not considered strong. This is especially so since the adoption by the UNGA of the SDGs in 2015. In particular, SDG 9 calls on states to “[b]uild resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster innovation” (UNGA, 2015, p. 20). The ITU has interpreted this as including three matters relating to ICTs and Internet access, being: “[n]ew and emerging applications”, “[d]igital transformation” through broadband (including 5G systems) and digital infrastructure generally, and “[e]xpanding connectivity” through widespread online/Internet access (ITU, 2022, p. 6). This suggests that developing countries certainly require ICTs and Internet access, and if the provision of these occurs it would also benefit developing countries if sustainability goals can also be achieved using these or related technologies (UN, 2019).
In developed countries digital technologies have extended to promoting green and sustainable growth and related goals. Often, this involves use of sensors in Internet of Things (IoT) systems. Scalable solutions for developing countries to achieve the same or similar goals are possible, but investment in ICTs and IoT systems, and in reliable Internet access, are necessary. Arguably, and it is recommended, the most beneficial way for developing countries to benefit from ICTs and Internet access is to, at the same time, make efforts in using these technologies to also achieve sustainability goals, while also connecting people. For example, generation of and access to electricity can be improved through digital technology (Khasru et. al., 2021). Therefore, it is not a question of either providing electricity or providing ICTs and Internet access, but rather how the two can be provided such that digital technology works with and benefits the reliable supply of electricity to developing communities (Ciocoiu, 2011). This synergistic approach is recommended.
The same can be said for medical care. For example, use of ICTs and artificial intelligence to monitor and help combat infectious diseases (ITU, 2022, p. 8) in developing communities, along with the aim of using ICTs and Internet access to democratize health care (ITU, 2022, p. 8). Also, sensors and satellite systems (as well as terrestrial systems) can be used to monitor crop and soil health, with data sharing taking place via Internet access and networks. This will benefit food supplies in developing communities. Use of sensors and other ICTs with hydroponic systems have shown good results (ITU, 2022, p. 7). Similarly, sensors that monitor water levels (e.g. in dams, reservoirs, wells) and that communicate data over the Internet can be crucial in efficiently allocating and using water, and giving better situational awareness (IWA, 2018) regarding availability of water, which may be scarce in developing communities.
Conclusion
The use of ICTs and Internet access, as shown by the examples given, will go some way towards decreasing poverty and enhancing personal security (Internet Society, 2017, p. 80), as well as collective human security, for people in developing communities. This requires building infrastructures for digital connectivity and cost-effectively providing ICT devices across developing communities. Combined with achieving sustainability goals, this is likely to reduce inequality and consequently poverty. This can be called ‘smart’ human security (Seghal, et. al., 2015) involving the IoT. More research can be done to advance this kind of argument.
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