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ABSTRACT: This chapter examines how trust can emerge and be sustained in the context of mobile transactions. It focuses on M-PESA, a
mobile banking system in Kenya, using data from an ethnographic study that was deployed in Kibera—one of Africa’s largest
slums. We present research in progress and discuss two main findings. Firstly, interpersonal trust relations between the customers
and agents are weak. Customers do not trust the agents with their money. Secondly, the institutional trust relations between
the customer and Safaricom, the mobile service provider offering M-PESA, are strong. This means that customers use the M-PESA
service because they believe that their money will be kept safe by Safaricom. After providing empirical evidence to substantiate
these claims, this study concludes by suggesting questions for future research.
Keywords: Mobile banking, M-PESA, trust, Kibera.
08/2008: pages 287-298;
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Social Dimensions of Information And Communication Technology Policy, Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on Human Choice and Computers (HCC8), IFIP TC 9, Pretoria, South Africa, September 25-26, 2008; 01/2008
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ABSTRACT: For more than a decade African nations have been investing in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) as a strategy for fostering development. Under the auspices of international development agencies such as the United Nations (UN), and World Bank these nations have been constituting and implementing technology strategies that aim to bring 'digital opportunities' to all constituents— especially those who are impoverished and living in remote communities. These strategies have put new demands on national governments to invest both human and financial resources into the expansion of telecommunications infrastructure and the training of new users. Such investments, however, have received some scrutiny as some claim that developing nations should focus their limited financial resources on the improvement of education or healthcare. Others argue that these ICT investments are vital for development, but should be synergized with others such as education and healthcare. In this study we will employ Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines (MARS) to explore the interaction amongst investments in ICT, education and healthcare. We further analyze how each class of investments impacts human development measures in five West African nations: Benin, Cameroon, Senegal, Ivory Coast and Niger. With such an analysis we illustrate the interdependencies amongst the three classes of investments and conclude that investments in ICTs alone are not enough to significantly impact human development. Complementary investments in education and healthcare must be given equal consideration.
EJISDC The Electronic Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries. 01/2007; 29(5):1-15.
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ABSTRACT: For more than a decade, key international organizations such as the World Bank, International Monetary Fund, the UN and International Telecommunications Union (ITU) have argued that investment in information communication and telecommunication (ICT) infrastructure is a prerequisite for the development of poor countries. However, dissenting voices of the international development community argue that African governments should focus their attention on building schools, delivering basic health care, electricity and clean water rather than on the building of costly ICT infrastructure with their limited financial resources. In this paper, we present an analysis of the relationships among investments in ICT, Health Care and Education and the human development index on five West African nations. We use a Stepwise regression analysis to help unravel the complex relationships among these variables. Our results provide evidence that complementary investments in ICT, health and education can significantly increase development. Given that developing nations are making considerable investments in healthcare, education and ICT and that there are concerns over the type of investments they should make, our findings are a significant contribution to the literature.
EJISDC: The Electronic Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries, ISSN 1681-4835, Vol. 23, 2006.
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ABSTRACT: In recent years, several case studies have appeared on how mobile telephones, SMS and the Internet had an impact on political activities. It has been widely argued that information and communication technology (ICT) is influencing democracy all over the world. However, few studies provide any analysis of how ICT expansion correlates with measures of democracy. In this paper, we investigate the relationship between the global expansion of ICT and the level of democracy within nations. We analyze archival data on 133 countries from 1995 to 2003, which was the period-of-time of explosive ICT expansion. Some important findings of our study are: (a) there is a growing digital divide in democratic freedoms among countries; (b) in spite of rapid ICT expansion in some countries, Internet filtering is having a significant impact on democratic freedoms.
Telematics and Informatics.
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[show abstract]
[hide abstract]
ABSTRACT: This chapter examines how trust can emerge and be sustained in the context of mobile transactions. It focuses on M-PESA, a mobile banking system in Kenya, using data from an ethnographic study that was deployed in Kiberaone of Africas largest slums. We present research in progress and discuss two main findings. Firstly, interpersonal trust relations between the customers and agents are weak. Customers do not trust the agents with their money. Secondly, the institutional trust relations between the customer and Safaricom, the mobile service provider offering M-PESA, are strong. This means that customers use the M-PESA service because they believe that their money will be kept safe by Safaricom. After providing empirical evidence to substantiate these claims, this study concludes by suggesting questions for future research. Full Text at Springer, may require registration or fee
International Federation for Information Processing Digital Library; Social Dimensions Of Information And Communication Technology Policy;.
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[show abstract]
[hide abstract]
ABSTRACT: This chapter examines how trust can emerge and be sustained in the context of mobile transactions. It focuses on M-PESA, a mobile banking system in Kenya, using data from an ethnographic study that was deployed in Kiberaone of Africas largest slums. We present research in progress and discuss two main findings. Firstly, interpersonal trust relations between the customers and agents are weak. Customers do not trust the agents with their money. Secondly, the institutional trust relations between the customer and Safaricom, the mobile service provider offering M-PESA, are strong. This means that customers use the M-PESA service because they believe that their money will be kept safe by Safaricom. After providing empirical evidence to substantiate these claims, this study concludes by suggesting questions for future research. Full Text at Springer, may require registration or fee
International Federation for Information Processing Digital Library; Social Dimensions Of Information And Communication Technology Policy;.
