African Women and Icts: Investigating Technology, Gender and Empowerment
... The empowerment or decreasing capacity of Information and Communications Technology (ICT). (Buskens and Webb 2009) (Hilbert 2011) among women is seen in various ways. The promise to eradicate women's participatory and organizational obstacles and three centuries-old gender inequities seems to be simple in new technology. ...
... It is claimed that addressing gender demands in practice may be the first step to sensitize people on the strategic interests of sex since the improvement of knowledge and self-esteem can destabilise gender norms that are socially accepted. (Hassanin 2002) (Buskens and Webb 2009) (Aminuzzaman et al. 2003) A third conceptualisation addresses the empowerment or the feeling of empowerment out of the perspective of the oppressed woman. Empowerment here is the capacity to make purposeful choices in life that inevitably reflect the community's standards and values. ...
... The site is accessible in all four regional and English languages and provides an indicator of the free hotline for anyone requiring computer or internet operation. (Kyomuhendo 2001) (Buskens and Webb 2009) (Kabeer 2001) The literacy criterion does not apply to alphabetized women who make up about one-third of India's female population, (Buskens and Webb 2009) despite the sex-sensitive design of the website. In addition, household and relationship recommendations, childcare, and motherhood guidance target typical urban homeowners and thus strengthen the sex. ...
This is an introduction to a distinct perspective on the subject of varied experience of science by both the genders since early modern times. In the research paper that follows, I attempt to offer helpful contexts in which key concepts, science and sex, are discussed, relevant historiographies detailed and particular, enlightening case studies presented. This special outlook shows, taken in its entirety, that gender science – including both men and women - was diverse and debated during the eighteenth century and that while there were almost exclusively men in formal scientific institutions and publishing houses, their gender relationships were varied. Numerous women still made significant contributions as practitioners and patrons in scientific research.
... Anderson (2012) further writes that more apparent evidence of under-representation of women in ICT is the low percentage of enrolment in tertiary ICT programmes. Women's limited access to knowledge and income resources compared to men, as argued by Buskens and Webb (2009), is also a contributing factor to the social exclusion. Much of scholarly history on every industrial revolution indicates that gender inequality in ICT largely emanates from the skewed process of recruitment, retention and the advancement of women in the fraternity. ...
... The raison d'etre behind the conceptualisation of this article is that gender inequality has been perennial since the inception of the first industrial revolution and therefore the emergence of the 4IR should not be seen as a panacea to the problem as the problem will most likely persist. Nevertheless, Buskens and Webb (2009) posit that women are more concerned with job security and flexibility of working hours while men are attracted to and motivated by technology and advancement in the ICT fraternity, hence the perennial imbalance. ...
... Men and women adapt to technology differently. Buskens and Webb (2009) write that women are more concerned with job security and flexibility of working hours, while men are attracted and motivated by technology and advancement in the ICT fraternity, hence the perennial problem. Rifkin (2013) also asserts that women adapt at a very slow rate to technology due to societal influence, as the gender schema theory seeks to explain that, men and women are raised with a societal perception that certain attributes, roles, tasks, responsibilities and attributes are associated with a specific gender. ...
A study of every industrial revolution would be incomplete without any reference to the scant inclusion of women in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector. It remains true that a plethora of women are still not extricated from the obfuscation of social inclusion in the technological space. The gender inequalities in ICT remains a perennial problem, consequently prompting a new debate. Closely related to this debate is the scant rate of the inclusion of women in the fourth industrial revolution (4IR). This article opines that men have more freedom to utilise technological devices than women due to, inter alia, limited knowledge regarding technological infrastructure. The article is conceptual in nature and relied on critical scholarship review as a methodological approach to obtain insights. The objective is to argue that gender inequality in ICT is most likely to persist in the 4IR. Furthermore, it provides a summation and conclusion on the 4IR.
... Many studies evaluated the participation of women and ICTs. 5,[16][17][18][19][20][21][22] Some focused on gender issues such as the underrepresentation of women in ICTs, 16 women's empowerment and ICTs, 5,20 and women and ICT career choices. 18,19 Gurumurthy et al., 17 Hilbert 21 , and Antonio and Tuffley 22 examined the extent to which ICTs have had a positive impact on women's voices. ...
... Many studies evaluated the participation of women and ICTs. 5,[16][17][18][19][20][21][22] Some focused on gender issues such as the underrepresentation of women in ICTs, 16 women's empowerment and ICTs, 5,20 and women and ICT career choices. 18,19 Gurumurthy et al., 17 Hilbert 21 , and Antonio and Tuffley 22 examined the extent to which ICTs have had a positive impact on women's voices. ...
The purpose of this study was to explore and compare women’s perceptions of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), empowerment, and success among respondents in eight countries. The research sample consisted of 969 participants (137 from Georgia, 105 from Poland, 130 from Romania, 152 from Slovenia, 102 from Spain, 123 from Taiwan, 120 from Turkey, and 100 from the United States). Qualitative data analysis was used for exploring participants’ perspectives among different cultures. The results showed that there were numerous differences among the respondents regarding their perceptions of Information and Communication Technologies, empowerment, and success. Positive experiences of ICTs were primarily related to simplifying communication and enabling easy access to information and methods for sharing it, while negative experiences were typically associated with privacy issues. The success of using ICTs was similarly related to the ability to increase awareness and simplify communication, both of which are necessary for women to reach specified goals and achieve success in the workplace.
... In yet another study on the use of computers in Bolivia, Wamala (2012) found that the use of computers by women considerably strengthened their self-esteem and sense of self-worth. Additionally, researchers have evaluated the level of participation of women in ICT, focusing on access of women to ICT and their empowerment (Huyer & Sikoska, 2003;Buskens & Webb, 2009). Buskens & Webb (2009) indicated that women's use of ICT allowed them to create spaces for refuge, expression, education, network, and trade. ...
... Additionally, researchers have evaluated the level of participation of women in ICT, focusing on access of women to ICT and their empowerment (Huyer & Sikoska, 2003;Buskens & Webb, 2009). Buskens & Webb (2009) indicated that women's use of ICT allowed them to create spaces for refuge, expression, education, network, and trade. ICT can serve as a tool for women's active participation to improve their situations and provide them with access to information to promote better health and alleviate poverty (Huyer & Sikoska, 2003). ...
Cyberfeminism is a woman-centered perspective that advocates women’s use of new information and communications technologies for empowerment. This paper explores the role of information technologies, in particular the role of social media, in empowering women entrepreneurship in emerging economies via increased social capital and improved self-efficacy. A conceptual model is offered and propositions are explicated.
... This statement is underpinned by the assumption that having access to technologies such as mobile phones is empowering. This simplistic logic is pervasive, despite many years of scholarship in the ICTD literature that has drawn attention to the complexity of the relationship between gender equality and technology (Buskens & Webb, 2009;Gillwald, Milek, & Stork, 2010;Gurumurthy & Chami, 2014;Hafkin & Huyer, 2006). Gurumurthy and Chami point out the ºaws in this logic. ...
Background
The use of mobile technologies in fostering health promotion and healthy behaviors is becoming an increasingly common phenomenon in global health programs. Although mobile technologies have been effective in health promotion initiatives and follow-up research in higher-income countries and concerns have been raised within clinical practice and research in low- and middle-income settings, there is a lack of literature that has qualitatively explored the challenges that participants experience in terms of being contactable through mobile technologies.
Objective
This study aims to explore the challenges that participants experience in terms of being contactable through mobile technologies in a trial conducted in Soweto, South Africa.
Methods
A convergent parallel mixed methods research design was used. In the quantitative phase, 363 young women in the age cohorts 18 to 28 years were contacted telephonically between August 2019 and January 2022 to have a session delivered to them or to be booked for a session. Call attempts initiated by the study team were restricted to only 1 call attempt, and participants who were reached at the first call attempt were classified as contactable (189/363, 52.1%), whereas those whom the study team failed to contact were classified as hard to reach (174/363, 47.9%). Two outcomes of interest in the quantitative phase were “contactability of the participants” and “participants’ mobile number changes,” and these outcomes were analyzed at a univariate and bivariate level using descriptive statistics and a 2-way contingency table. In the qualitative phase, a subsample of young women (20 who were part of the trial for ≥12 months) participated in in-depth interviews and were recruited using a convenience sampling method. A reflexive thematic analysis approach was used to analyze the data using MAXQDA software (version 20; VERBI GmbH).
Results
Of the 363 trial participants, 174 (47.9%) were hard to reach telephonically, whereas approximately 189 (52.1%) were easy to reach telephonically. Most participants (133/243, 54.7%) who were contactable did not change their mobile number. The highest percentage of mobile number changes was observed among participants who were hard to reach, with three-quarters of the participants (12/16, 75%) being reported to have changed their mobile number ≥2 times. Eight themes were generated following the analysis of the transcripts, which provided an in-depth account of the reasons why some participants were hard to reach. These included mobile technical issues, coverage issues, lack of ownership of personal cell phones, and unregistered number.
Conclusions
Remote data collection remains an important tool in public health research. It could, thus, serve as a hugely beneficial mechanism in connecting with participants while actively leveraging the established relationships with participants or community-based organizations to deliver health promotion and practice.
... For greater context, development is the product of both political processes taking place in institutions that are mostly male-dominated, and, in most regions, these economic processes have undermined the agency of women in developing countries. Recently, development studies have seen an exponential rise in feminist critiques which emphasize that development is not the 'utopia' it is expected to be for the empowerment of women (Buskens & Webb, 2009;Masika & Bailur, 2015). While social media can play an important economic and social role for some women, subsequent research has found that it also encourages restrictive and unequal gender stereotypes that were originally designed for a male audience (Kabeer, 1999;Parpart et al., 2003). ...
The current paper examines how women in Bangladesh contest
abuse within patriarchal systems of control. In many cases, women will
often decide the extent to which they adopt a particular technology to
prevent experiences of abuse on social media platforms. In the current
study, we analysed how women’s online presence is controlled by
patriarchal norms which impede their agency and recontextualise their
empowerment through social media. As such, we rely on the narratives
of three women in Dhaka, Bangladesh to understand how they exercise
agency on social media platforms to ensure their own empowerment
and avoid (further) experiences of abuse. Although we recognise that
ICT for Development (ICT4D) can be a crucial way to ensure women’s
empowerment, we argue that, as a male-dominated space, social media
platforms promote restrictive and unequal gender stereotypes that
require women to find alternative strategies to challenge and resist
existing patriarchal structures.
... Interventions that apply ICTs to women's empowerment have a long history in the development sector (Abubakar et al., 2017;Asiedu, 2006). Buskens and Webb (2009) use 17 such case studies in multiple African countries to highlight this. Many of the women-centered ICT and Data Science Training programs included in this review use the terms "empower," "empowering," or "empowerment" in publicly available descriptions of their activities. ...
The increasing datafication of African societies has led to a proliferation of data science-related training opportunities. These trainings provide young people with the opportunity to learn the skills to work on Data science, with some focused specifically on women and girls. While this is encouraging and brings new opportunities for women and girls to participate in the knowledge economy, it is important to understand the wider context of data science training in Africa, in particular, how women and girls experience their (data science) education, and how this knowledge can impact their lives, sustain livelihoods and bring empowerment. Through a review of the literature, as well as an examination of different pedagogical approaches and practices used by various formal and informal training programs in Africa, we examined the experience of women and girls. We conducted a mapping of the training and networks that have been set up to provide knowledge and skills and to empower women in data science. We highlight some of the facilitators that have positively contributed to a greater participation of women and girls in data science education, while also revealing some of the barriers and structural impediments to fair access to training for women in data science.
... The feminist standpoint relevant to the aims of this paper, and, in the context of the case study's epistemological perspective, posits that women entrepreneurship and intrapreneurship theories produced for women "knowers" do not include women's gendered perspectives (socially situated knowledge) in inquiry, which to the knower, is best understood (epistemic authority to claims) from lived experiences exposing the "real" gender blindness (Buskens & Webb, 2009) inherent into the ICT sector, that are subdued and, in consequence, render women's entrepreneurial [intrapreneurial] activities or patriarchal (Harding 2004) relations, invisible. ...
This paper seeks to create awareness of the need for research academics and practitionersinvolved in the ICT field collaborate in co-producing feminist empirical research studies thatintegrate theory and practice (evidence-based) when doing research on the circumstancerelated to women’s entrepreneurship and intrapreneurship in the context of the Eastern CapeProvince in South Africa, which is under scrutiny. The notion of cross-professional collaboration istriggered by recommendations extrapolated from a qualitative case study conducted on the ICTsector in the Eastern Cape, wherein the findings allude to a gap in empirical research studiesemploying feminist epistemological and methodological norms of inquiry in examining women’sentrepreneurial and intrapreneurial activities. This paper advances the view that initiating atrend within the researcher community, where follow-up studies are conducted from researchrecommendations, will stimulate reflection and debate around empirically grounded feministscholarship in an emerging and unexplored field of research, namely women’s entrepreneurshipand intrapreneurship, in both urban and rural settings of the ICT sector.
... Empirical findings have shown that gender stereotypes deter women's active utilisation of ICT (Buskens & Webb, 2009;Edwina, 2005). There is also a general belief that women are lagging behind when it comes to the use of ICT (Hallberg, Kulecho, Kulecho & Okoth, 2011). ...
The use of e-learning facilities is expected to foster lecturers' job effectiveness in higher institutions. However, observation revealed that challenges like ease of use and technical know-how persist. This study, investigated lecturers' job effectiveness through the use of e-learning facilities in the University of Ibadan. Two research questions were raised. The study adopted non-experimental design. Population comprised 926 lecturers in faculties, institutes and centres in the University of Ibadan. Fourteen faculties (48 departments), 3 institutes and 2 centres which are academic units domiciled in the University main campus were purposively selected due to proximity. Five lecturers were randomly selected from each academic unit, giving a total sample of 265 lecturers. Data was collected using Lecturers' Job Effectiveness Questionnaire (LJEQ) validated through content validity with ordinal alpha reliability of r=0.95. Analysis was carried out using frequency and unpaired t-test. Results showed that lecturers recognised that the use of e-learning facilities could enhance their job effectiveness. However, majority of them do not often use electronic board. Further, result showed that lecturers' gender use of e-learning facilities and job effectiveness in the University of Ibadan was not significant. The study, recommends that lecturers should use e-learning facilities for increased productivity in carrying out their academic work.
... Gadgets such as smartphones have made this even easier. The prospects of ICT in enhancing economic development and promoting women's empowerment seem promising (Buskens & Webb, 2009). Scholars like Sharma (2003) and Stephen (2006) suggest that ICT can empower women through enabling participation in economic and social development activities and facilitating informed decision-making. ...
Gender inequality remains an important theme in global development conversation because women suffer from gender-related inequalities. Despite the increasing awareness of this problem due to decades of campaigns and interventions, the problem still persists.
... Les technologies locales et l'usage des technologies importées est un sujet étudié en mettant en relief le genre en Afrique (Buskens et Webb, 2009). Si l'usage des TIC constitue en soi une innovation, l'étude d'une telle innovation devient pertinente lorsqu'on en perçoit des impacts substantiels ou lorsqu'on considère ses effets à travers les institutions directrices et ses politiques dans un pays. ...
Cet article dresse l’état des savoirs sur les innovations sociales en Afrique subsaharienne. L’objectif est d’explorer et de mettre en lumière les trajectoires émergentes sur ce sujet encore peu abordé, pour un continent confronté entre l’extraversion des modes de développement dans un contexte de crises multiformes et la dynamique des réalités historiques. Pour cela, l’article revisite les écrits et explore les cas emblématiques en recentrant la recherche sur une temporalité des années 1960 à ce jour où la confrontation des deux mouvements a engendré une hybridation qui articule les innovations. La principale trouvaille concerne, d’une part, la focalisation des innovations sociales sur l’humain portées par des organisations liées à l’économie sociale et, d’autre part, l’arrimage entre les enjeux, les défis et les pratiques dont les repères locaux particularisent ces innovations. Il ressort des cas analysés un ensemble de logiques opératoires marquées par l’interaction des technologies importées et des mécanismes préexistants sur lesquelles les technologies novatrices prennent naissance. Le foisonnement de telles technologies permet d’ouvrir des perspectives de recherche mettant en scène les structures socio--territoriales, l’omniprésence d’activités solidaires et la prédominance des acteurs communautaires devant combiner les dimensions sociale, institutionnelle, économique, technique et académique.
... Studies have shown that gender stereotypes hinder women's active utilization of ICT (Buskens & Webb, 2009;Edwina, 2005). It is also a general believe that women are lagging behind when it comes to the use of ICT (Hallberg, Kulecho, Kulecho & Okoth, 2011). ...
This study investigates lecturers' level of utilization of ICT facilities for teaching purposes in Nigerian universities. A descriptive survey design was adopted for the study. And a questionnaire with a reliability of 0.907 was used for data collection. Data was collected at the Abubakar Tafawa Balewa University, Bauchi from a sample of 433 lecturers out of a population of 928. The results show that lecturers have the knowledge of using ICT facilities in teaching, however, they rarely use them in teaching. It was also found that lecturers' age and years of teaching experiences were significant factors influencing the level of ICT utilization in teaching. However, no significant difference was found due to gender and educational qualification. It was recommended among others that there should be regular sensitization programmes on the importance of using ICT facilities as it promotes students' learning and enhance their academic achievement.
... Though the access of the ICT among the women has been increased, technology is most likely being shaped by gender or could be vice versa (Oudshoorn, Saetnan, & Lie, 2002). The use of technology and receiving benefits is also very much stimulated by our social values, gender roles and various stereotypes in our society (Buskens & Webb, 2009). The gender gap, especially the gap between men and women and how they benefit from information technology has widened because women are less likely than men to receive technical education or be employed in technology intensive work (Pande & Weide, 2012). ...
Exponential use of ICT has brought colossal opportunities as well as challenges to the present society. In spite of increasing women’s involvement in Information, Communication and Technology (ICT) , gender inequality has yet remained critical across the nations and globe. The uneven access and skills to technology has intensified the degree of digital divide specially for the women. Further the multifaced attribute of ICT and its relation with women is changing discourses among the feminist scholars. This is a conceptual paper which focuses on the deliberations of different feminists based on optimistic and pessimistic perspectives. Some studies show that the gender digital divide is getting intense while some have reported of alleviating gaps with more involvement of women. The concept of digital divide is beyond the access and includes various dimensions such as perception, usage, motivation, participation and skills. The paper deals with the tension between utopian and dystopian views on technology benefits. Through literature review this conceptual paper examines and discusses the diverse standpoints of feminist scholars from west and east which buzzes to redefine the relationship of gender with technology. It recommends that empowerment of women in technological domain is equally important as social, economic and political. Further women should be motivated from within to embrace ICT and get benefitted from its prospects. Resisting modern technology in the digital era would further widen the digital gap and thus make difficult to observe gender equality. More studies are required to explore the strategies for technological empowerment of women.
... The position of women in societies in developing countries puts them at a disadvantage (Buskens & Webb, 2009;Hilbert, 2011). For instance, women in rural areas of developing countries have many more responsibilities compared to their male partners (Bowie & Geubbels, 2013). ...
Reducing maternal mortality rate (MMR) by 75% by the year 2015 was the primary target for Millennium Development Goal 5. However, between 1990 and 2015 the MMR only fell by 50%. Sustainable Development Goal 3 aims to reduce the global MMR to 0.1% by the year 2030. Mobile technology for healthcare service delivery (mHealth) is being implemented in many developing countries to address challenges faced in maternal health in trying to achieve this goal. Existing literature on mHealth tends to focus mainly on design and implementation of mHealth projects, a few studies have evaluated mHealth interventions to assess health outcomes. This study evaluates the effectiveness of mHealth based on consumers' capabilities, and investigates how mHealth contributes towards social change and human development using the capability approach theoretical framework. The findings show that the use of mobile phones to access health information and healthcare services can generate a number of opportunities for women in maternal health, not only for health purposes but also for their informational, economic and psychological wellbeing. However, the generation of the opportunities and realisation of the outcomes is mediated by a myriad of personal, social, and environmental factors that are either enabling or restrictive.
... Bridging this gap is key to women's empowerment and greater economic gain. However, a set of interconnected variables, including economic (cost, income), individual (confidence, literacy) and societal (security and harassment) factors are key in constraining mobile access (see for example, Buskens and Webb, 2009;. With this in mind, we turn to the potential for income generation. ...
For many women in resource-constrained environments, mobile phones are the first and foremost information and communication technology (ICT) used. In theory the increasing pervasiveness of mobiles and mobile Internet across developing countries should provide growing opportunities to women, especially in terms of earning through small, on-the-fly jobs-using the very mobility aspect of the devices. Using Donner's six affordances of mobile Internet and Cornwall's discussion of the meaning of women's empowerment, we analyse data from 30 focus groups conducted with 18-25 year olds earning under $2 a day in peri-urban areas of Nairobi (Kenya), Accra (Ghana) and Jinja (Uganda). We explore the relation between the affordances of mobile Internet and structural changes in the economic and societal status of subjects, as reflected in the narratives of women adopters. We find that such affordances, while leading to new mechanisms for income generation, do not result in changes of societal structures: older cultural stereotypes are built around adoption of the new technology, and policies underlying economic activities are hardly challenged by digitalisation. This problematises the extent to which the mobile Internet can be universally conceived as a tool for income generation, and by extension as a long-term, secure means to the empowerment of many women.
... Analyses have been further enriched by recent studies exploring the rise of revolutionary efforts over the past 5 years and the role of technology in coordinating and mobilizing dissent. Focusing on the Global South, writers such as Ineke Buskens and AnneWebb (2009Webb ( , 2014also Buskens, 2013) have featured the use of technology for women's mobilization over the past decade in Africa and Asia. The progress of the cyberfeminist vision is challenged by continued underrepresentation of women in leadership positions within the field of technology. ...
Despite steady economic and social development in Bangladesh, women are in an underprivileged situation in many ways. This study explores the association between the use of information and communication technology (ICT) and women’s empowerment in Bangladesh. This study employs ordinary least squares regression, the ordered logit model, and the multinomial logit model, using Financial Inclusion Insights (2017) Survey data, to investigate the relationship between mobile phone use and women’s empowerment. The study’s main result indicates that mobile phone use facilitates women’s empowerment in general, but the impact needs to be considered for different groups of women. Housewives who are restricted within the household are impacted less than non-housewives by mobile phone use, contrary to our expectations. Also heads of households and spouses of heads of households, who are in very different positions in a patriarchal family structure, are similarly impacted by mobile phone use. This result implies that ICT only affects the empowerment of women who are not restricted to the household, and we conclude that ICT access alone is not enough to ensure women’s awareness about their rights.
This chapter examines the transformative impact of digital tools on the economic empowerment of rural women, highlighting how mobile phones, internet access, and digital financial services enhance women's access to vital resources, including information, markets, and financial services. Mobile technology, particularly mobile banking and money services, has enabled secure transactions, empowering women to save, borrow, and invest independently. Access to digital tools also bridges the knowledge gap between rural and urban areas by providing women with critical information on market trends, agricultural practices, and more, which supports informed decision making and productivity. Furthermore, digital platforms facilitate ongoing skill development and networking, allowing rural women to engage in collaborative communities. Despite these advancements, challenges such as limited digital literacy, infrastructure, and cultural barriers persist requiring targeted policy interventions to foster inclusive digital empowerment.
Motivation
The adoption of yield‐enhancing agricultural inputs can improve rural livelihoods. Lack of savings is widely believed to be one of the main barriers to the adoption of agricultural technology in sub‐Saharan Africa. That may be changing, as the spread of mobile phones in many African countries has facilitated access to new financial technologies, such as mobile money and mobile banking.
Purpose
How does access to mobile banking affect the adoption of yield‐enhancing inputs in Côte d'Ivoire? In particular, how does mobile banking affect the uptake of inorganic fertilizers and phytosanitary products to protect crops against weeds, pests, and diseases?
Approach and methods
Drawing on data from the Harmonized Survey on Household Living Conditions (Enquête Harmonisée sur les Conditions de Vie des Ménages, EHCVM 2018–2019) for Côte d'Ivoire, we use regression analysis to estimate the factors affecting adoption.
The decision to have a mobile bank account may be endogenous, so we use instrumental variables to address potential bias.
Findings
Having a mobile bank account is associated with a 14% greater likelihood of investing in modern agricultural inputs. The impact is particularly high for investments in chemical or inorganic fertilizers, where having a mobile account makes adoption 30% more likely.
Policy implications
Many governments in sub‐Saharan Africa rely heavily on costly subsidies to encourage the adoption of improved farm technologies. Access to mobile banking offers a cheaper way to promote the adoption of technology.
The potential of mobile banking to serve as an effective savings tool and transform the lives of smallholder farmers will depend on government policy. While the government of Côte d'Ivoire has made greater efforts than its neighbours to increase the availability of mobile banking technology, much remains to be done.
The term “digital divide” has evolved from being seen as a binary to a continuum of access to and use of digital technologies. Dimensions of access include availability, affordability, necessary skills, and access to meaningful content in a relevant language, as well as times and spaces of access. Frequently, digital divides trace existing social divides; however, the work of the Information and Communication Technologies for Development community supports marginalized groups in particular to make use of, for instance, mobile phones, the Internet, computers, and applications. While mobile Internet access opens up new possibilities, the conflicting trends of increased commercialization of online space, Internet rights, and the Open Access, Open Data movement mean that the contours and nature of the Internet in the future are highly contested and uncertain.
This study explored men's perception of women's participation and VAW (Violence against women) on an online learning platform called "Hallo". Based on the analysis of in-depth interviewed data collected from male users of the application, the study found that men hold an egalitarian view in respect of the participation of their female counterparts. Though the majority of the men perceived the platform as a tool for women's empowerment through educative elements, exchange of knowledge, language learning opportunities, and development of communication skills, they did not fail to give proper attention to women's safety on this digital podium. Emphasis was given on women's 'self-responsibility' and 'awareness' to handle violence perpetrated by male users against them. Primarily, cultural and religious boundaries, strengthened by patriarchy, were marked as leading determiners of women's communication leeway in the learning space. Besides that, the normalization of violence was found justified by divergent labels such as 'mere amusement', 'right to freedom of expression', or 'temporary moral shift'. Moreover, the study discovered that women of Asian and Arab origins get victimized specifically for their stereotypical feminine temperament while rude talking patterns, fame motives, or dating intentions are considered liable for violence against women regardless of their race, color, creed, or location.
Attainment of sexual and reproductive health is regarded as a human rights matter. Notwithstanding this, maternal mortality continues to be a major public health concern in low-income countries, especially those in sub-Saharan Africa. Maternal mortality remains high in Africa, yet there are information communication technologies (ICTs) (such as the internet, mobile communication, social media, and community radios) that have the potential to make a difference. Making effective use of all of these ICTs can considerably decrease preventable maternal deaths. ICTs, particularly mobile devices, offer a platform for access to health information and services that can bring change in areas where health infrastructure and resources are often limited. However, for Southern Africa, maternal mortality remains high despite the presence of ICT tools that have transformative potential to improve maternal health. In light of this, this study sought to examine the impact of ICT on maternal health. The study was quantitative in nature, and it used panel data that covered the period from 2000–2018. The Mean Group and Pooled Mean Group cointegration techniques and a generalised method of moments panel technique were used for estimation purposes. Results showed that ICT has a negative effect on maternal health. This shows that ICT tools contribute positively to maternal health. The study gave a number of recommendations. The mobile gender gap should be closed (digital inclusion), mobile network connectivity boosted, and digital platforms must be created in order to enhance the transformative potential of ICT in improving health outcomes.
The Covid-19 pandemic has not only radically affected lives and ways of living but has wreaked havoc on education systems globally. United Nations estimates that over 1.6 billion students worldwide have been affected by school closures that were necessitated by the pandemic. Although learning and teaching continued virtually in various countries, the challenges of this new mode of education were more burdensome in some countries than in others. While studies on the impact of the pandemic on education and gender inequalities have been conducted, few have focused specifically on the impact of the pandemic on girl child education. This chapter discusses the impact of the pandemic on girl child education in Africa. Although the authors present the cases of two of Africa’s biggest economies, Nigeria and South Africa, the recommendations for research and policy presented will undoubtedly prove useful to other countries on the continent and improve education generally.
Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are generating substantial interest from aid donors and development practitioners, including as tools for agricultural extension. However, empirical evidence of the impact of ICT-enabled extension on farmers’ uptake of introduced technologies remains scarce. This four-year study evaluates an ICT-enabled extension project in Senegal using radio and mobile phone services to encourage rural smallholder farmers’ use of certified improved seeds and organic and inorganic fertilizers across Senegal. Data were collected using large-scale annual surveys in six regions over four years as well as focus groups. The findings suggest that, in general, the forms and format of ICT-enabled extension services deployed failed to significantly contribute to the adoption of promoted technologies. Personal connections to participatory farm trials were consistently associated with adoption, and phone-based voice messaging appears to have potential to increase technology uptake. Gender-based disparities in engagement with ICT services and Senegal’s poorly developed systems for producing and distributing quality seeds emerged as key factors limiting the effectiveness of this project. These findings raise concerns about the equity and effectiveness of ICT-enabled extension in promoting agricultural inputs in contexts like Senegal and have important implications for similar efforts in other countries.
This paper examines how mobile communication and mobile banking is used by women in rural western Kenya (Elgeyo Marakwet), a resource-constrained area where women must carefully monitor the flow of money through their households. Also, women face structural inequality. Among other things, polygyny (one husband and several wives) is legal. Based on the inductive analysis of 25 interviews with women, and using the lens of intersectionality, we examine their use of mobile banking. We examine how mobile technology plays into the management of the household economy, and how it is used in extramarital relationships. We discuss how women use mobile communication in their collective savings groups (chama). We see how the mobile phone can be the locus of tensions within the household and how mBanking both supports the lives of the women but also how this can eventually undercut social support.
The paper highlights the problems associated with the usage of ICT components among extension agents in three selected States Agricultural Development Projects (ADPs) of Nigeria. Two hundred and four (204) Village Extension Agents (VEAs) were sampled as respondents for the study. With aid of simple statistical tools (average, cumulative and percentages), and the analysis of the results indicate that for each platforms of ICT used by the extension agents, there were peculiar problems they faced. Some of the major constraints identified were: poor and lack of network/services, lack of electricity/batteries to power them, the cost of purchasing it was too expensive, lack of access/un-availability, lack of money to buy air time/or recharge cards, lack of maintenance, inability to operate it and lack of awareness. Others were; poor quality of video; and lack of knowledge of operating it/too complicated, poor maintenance capacity, it gets spoilt or malfunction and lack of time to use them. . The paper puts forth recommendations aimed at solving the problems and enhancing improvement in the job performance of extension agents.
The growth of Information Communication Technology (ICT) has empowered communities in diverse ways. Both males and females use ICTs to transact businesses and carry on relationships. Access and use of mobile phones have changed people's lives. This chapter discusses the magical revolution of mobile telephony in Africa and specifically in Kenya. Innovations such as MPESA have transformed people's lives in Kenya and in other emerging economies. Both males and females have used the innovations to bring about development that has enriched their lives. Secondly, the role of gender socialization is discussed in relation to how the ICTs have eliminated the long-held belief that females are not participants in societal development. Thirdly, the role of the media in development is examined because they socialize people into the gender roles. Through mobile telephones, females perform diverse roles. Positive portrayal of men and women in development acknowledges that men and women must be active members of the process.
This article explains a conceptual tool that was used in the Gender Research in Africa and the Middle East into ICT for Empowerment (GRACE) Network, to map journeys of personal and social change toward a self-determined purpose of transformation. Named the Personal Trajectory Map, it was initially intended as a self-management tool for the GRACE members to help clarify thinking, manage emotions and stay focused on project purposes, but its use got extended over time. This article is a moment in the ongoing theorization of this conceptual tool and the approach it was an intricate part of. Its usefulness can be theoretically explained through the interlinkages between the concepts of agency, intent, conation, and the capacity to aspire. Illustrating how it was used in some of the participatory action research processes, this article argues that it is worthwhile to open the black box of the female-self-in-transformation since it will clarify for female participants as well as for their researchers, what they are up against when they want to empower themselves in a male dominated world. Furthermore, offering women a deeper understanding and more guidance in their processes of personal and social change, will not only support female participants, it will enhance research quality and the chances for project success.
In this chapter, I want to argue that contrary to the popular belief from cyber optimists, the upsurge and use of social media in Africa’s poor economies have failed to produce a robust and vibrant public sphere, as we know it (Habermas 1992). At its best media literacy in the digital age must be about the ability not only to use the myriad of new technologies but also to have critical and interpretive skills to sift through the twin impediments of media saturation, information overload, and obfuscation of issues by power. Hence, media literacy has always been associated with active citizenship especially in its most radical formulation as a discursive space and identity (see Rosaldo, Cultural Anthropology. 9: 402–411, 1994; Potter 2001). To argue my case, I will use Zimbabwe’s burgeoning Twittersphere where so many now enjoy access, yet the benefits of critical engagement reminiscent of the public sphere appear to be in doubt if not totally absent. In short, has the democratization of access to the public sphere through digital technologies been undermined by the intractable problem of the democratic divide and literacy divide?
The growth of Information Communication Technology (ICT) has empowered communities in diverse ways. Both males and females use ICTs to transact businesses and carry on relationships. Access and use of mobile phones have changed people’s lives. This chapter discusses the magical revolution of mobile telephony in Africa and specifically in Kenya. Innovations such as MPESA have transformed people’s lives in Kenya and in other emerging economies. Both males and females have used the innovations to bring about development that has enriched their lives. Secondly, the role of gender socialization is discussed in relation to how the ICTs have eliminated the long-held belief that females are not participants in societal development. Thirdly, the role of the media in development is examined because they socialize people into the gender roles. Through mobile telephones, females perform diverse roles. Positive portrayal of men and women in development acknowledges that men and women must be active members of the process.
Digital inequality is a burgeoning field of study across disciplines, yet few papers address categorical digital inequality in cross-national samples. Using the only available cross-national data on access to Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) disaggregated by gender from the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), I add to existing literature by examining factors associated with women’s unequal access to mobile phones across 51 countries. The largest of such samples, the ITU data demonstrates that the type and levels of gender inequality in mobile phone use are not consistent throughout countries. In fact, the distribution is quite variable, from incorporating a small-sample of nations where women have marginally higher access, to sub-samples close to parity, to a larger sub-sample where women are at a substantial disadvantage. Using Quantile Regression Methods to assess these variations, I test how major gender and international development theories inform inequality patterns. My findings suggest that women’s wellbeing, as measured by their access to modern contraception (i.e., reproductive autonomy), overwhelmingly promotes women’s relative access to mobile phones, regardless of preexisting levels of access. Other perspectives like the growth imperative and world polity theory show some staggered associations along the distribution that remain substantively inconclusive.
This landscape review on mobiles and youth workforce development covers the potential and actual role of mobile in 5 areas: strengthening job-relevant skills through education and training, increasing labor demand, addressing job-search constraints, entrepreneurship and enterprise development, and social constraints to employment. It highlights promising areas and notes where the evidence base is weak.
Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are reported to hold a lot of promise for sustainable development, poverty reduction, and the empowerment of marginalised groups, such as women and minorities in developing countries. This article discusses the relationship between women’s empowerment and ICTs, by investigating the promise of empowerment associated with the use of WhatsApp by women in Nigeria. It draws upon Sen’s Capability Approach (CA) to explore some implications of the use of WhatsApp mobile application on human development. We employed Sen’s five instrumental freedoms to evaluate how WhatsApp has empowered women by concentrating on the opportunities provided for expanding their freedom to participate in social, economic, and political activities. Our analysis shows that WhatsApp can contribute to the empowerment of women by enabling their freedoms to participate in developmental activities; however, some contextual factors impede the ability of the women to take full advantage of these developmental opportunities that WhatsApp offers. The article concludes with some implications for policymakers advancing an agenda for “ICTs for Development”.
This work takes stock of existing ICT indicators disaggregated by sex, assesses data availability and identified main gaps based on an evaluation of needs and demand for such indicators. It also identifies areas covered as well as potential new areas where sex-disaggregated data are desirable and the methodological work needed in order to develop relevant indicators to fill the data gaps. The report is a input to the work of the Partnership on Measuring ICT for Development on measuring ICT and gender and is intended to serve as a basis for further discussions with countries on this subject.
The paper uses a survey of cases from South Africa to interrogate the prospects and challenges of using Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) for sustainable environmental management. The examples demonstrate the practical application of ICTs in collecting, storing and disseminating indigenous knowledge for culturally specific environmental issues. The paper advances the view that community-based ICT centres could be useful tools for facilitating the transmission of culturally specific environmental information and the promotion of interface between indigenous and other knowledge systems for community-based environmental management. This implies that ICT services should be designed to enhance these processes and community needs. This will make ICT more relevant, cost effective hence locally manageable and sustainable. Moreover, since most of the IKS in local communities are orally transmitted, the focus should be made on technologies that promote oral interaction such as audio-visual technologies and text to speech.
Across the globe, our work and social lives are increasingly integrated with Information and Communication
Technologies (ICT), yet massive disparities in the values, uses and benefits of ICT exist. New methods are
needed to shed light on unique and integrative concepts of ICT across cultures. This paper explores the use of visual methods to facilitate critical engagement with ICT—defined as situational awareness, reflexive ICT practice and power and control over ICT. This definition of critical ICT engagement is informed by a cultural identity lens, and intends to improve participatory methods in ICT for Development (ICT4D) and community technology design and application. Our notion of critical ICT engagement is developed through an analysis of three case studies, each employing visual methods to shed light on concepts and practices of ICT cross-culturally. This paper makes three contributions to the ICT4D literature. First, it establishes a cultural identity lens to chart out cultural differences between researchers and participants, and to develop situational awareness of ICT in context. Second, it defines the conceptual domain of reflexive ICT practice and establishes the key role of researchers in facilitating it. Third, it argues for the need to support participants to develop capacity to engage critically with ICT as a means to influence social and organizational structures. This paper offers a way for researchers and practitioners to engage with cultural issues in community-based research and design using visual methodologies.
This entry concerns the relationship between gender and information and communication technology (ICT) in the context of and for the purpose of development. After a brief discussion of gender concepts and a short historical overview of the field, the main research issues and questions are presented. Researchers' perspectives on the information society, their understanding of development, and their intentionalities toward the outcomes of their research define research orientation and design. Since project evaluation and researcher collaboration require acknowledgment of this diversity, this entry discusses these aspects. All stakeholders (researchers, research participants, and donors) are socialized in cultural environments that are grounded in gender inequality and, therefore, sexism in gender and ICT4D (ICT for development) research and the remedies to overcome it are also discussed, suggesting that striving for research quality and the imperative to overcome gender inequality in and through ICT4D projects requires nothing less than a commitment on the part of all stakeholders to become gender aware.
Mobile phones have been posited as enhancing women's entrepreneurship and gender equality in developing countries, yet empowerment outcomes are unclear. This article considers how women in the gender-segregated informal economy construct their entrepreneurial identity in relation to mobile phones and the discursive repertoires that marginalize and empower. Using data from interviews with six urban female street traders in Kampala, Uganda, it explores how these repertoires illustrate their sense of self, positioning and belonging to the business community. Normative representations and positioning of female traders can sideline entrepreneurial identity and over-validate gender identity. But, participants also negotiate entrepreneurial identity construction in response to these marginalizing influences. Although the data demonstrate that participants are equivocal about their entrepreneurial identity or fit in business, some representations are more validating and offer a sense of belonging. The article concludes by highlighting the nuanced opportunities for social change their discursive repertoires may present.
The pervasiveness of mobile phones enables people in marginalised contexts, including African rural areas, to access the Internet. Evidence suggests that women are increasingly at the forefront of ICT adoption. This paper explores how and why women in Dwesa, a South African rural area, learn to access the Internet on their mobile phones. Extensive research in this area was analysed to provide a solid background to a small-scale, in-depth qualitative study. Our findings reveal that rural women can be digitally literate and information-aware users who are deeply embedded in local social networks and use their phone to mediate the local context. This is significant as it contradicts a stereotypical image of African rural women as marginal participants in the information age.
The study examines the effect of women’s empowerment in agriculture on household nutrition—i.e. the availability of carbohydrates, protein, and fat—and household food poverty measured by monetary food shortfall. The analysis is done by applying instrumental variable estimation to a sample of 2642 households from a 2012 population-based survey conducted in northern Ghana. Overall, the results indicate that women’s empowerment positively influences nutrient availability and negatively influences monetary food shortfall. By decomposing women’s empowerment into its component domains, this study identified that the domains of Income, Production, and Leadership are areas for intervention to influence households’ nutrient availability and monetary food shortfall outcomes. The effect of the Time and Resources domains reveal that some intra-household trade-offs may exist. Thus, policies aimed at empowering women to ultimately improve household nutrition and food poverty need to be based on the understanding of these specific interactions.
Caracteres. Estudios culturales y críticos de la esfera digital Caracteres es una revista académica interdisciplinar y plurilingüe orientada al análisis crítico de la cultura, el pensamiento y la sociedad de la esfera digital. Esta publicación prestará especial atención a las colaboraciones que aporten nuevas perspectivas sobre los ámbitos de estudio que cubre, dentro del espacio de las Humanidades Digitales. Puede consultar las normas de publicación en la web
Research on the use of ICTs for international development, or information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) research, has a history going back some 30 years. The purpose of this paper is to take stock of the ICT4D research field at this important juncture in time, when ICTs are increasingly pervasive and when many different disciplines are involved in researching the area. The paper first provides some reflections on the history of the field broken down into three phases from the mid-1980s to the present day. This is followed by a detailed discussion of future research agenda, including topic selection, the role of theory, methodological issues and multidisciplinarity, and research impact. ICT4D research started largely in the academic field of information systems but it is concluded that the future lies in a multidisciplinary interaction between researchers, practitioners, and policy-makers.
In feminist literature, there is a sense that the mobile phone amplifies women’s voices in a public sphere crowded by male domination. But how is this possible, when the attributes of mobile phones (mobility, connectivity, sociability) contradict the socialisation of women, particularly in Africa, where a ‘desirable’ femininity entails withdrawal from public spaces, shyness and being mostly confined to domestic settings? Using domestication theory, this study explores these questions through in-depth interviews with young female and male students in three higher learning institutions in Harare. While the mobile phone and Internet amplify the importance of identity construction and the psychological need by young women to formulate an empowering sense of self, there is a dialectical tension between the need for women’s autonomy from disempowering social processes vis-à-vis conformity to social hierarchy. Overall, these technologies – among other more formal processes such as education and legislation – expand the range of processes which advance women’s emancipation. While the private appropriation of digital media technologies by individuals in Africa is interlaced with contextual nuances and peculiarities, this opens up new possibilities for understanding the private as political, and for the popular to have serious public implications.
The growth of Information Communication Technology (ICT) has empowered communities in diverse ways. Both males and females use ICTs to transact businesses and carry on relationships. Access and use of mobile phones have changed people's lives. This chapter discusses the magical revolution of mobile telephony in Africa and specifically in Kenya. Innovations such as MPESA have transformed people's lives in Kenya and in other emerging economies. Both males and females have used the innovations to bring about development that has enriched their lives. Secondly, the role of gender socialization is discussed in relation to how the ICTs have eliminated the long-held belief that females are not participants in societal development. Thirdly, the role of the media in development is examined because they socialize people into the gender roles. Through mobile telephones, females perform diverse roles. Positive portrayal of men and women in development acknowledges that men and women must be active members of the process.
In many parts of Africa, as elsewhere, women are underrepresented in undergraduate and graduate computing degree programs and there are gender inequalities in the workplace in computing fields. Women face challenges ranging from inexperience, poor social and economic background, culture, access to resources and discrimination. This poster is a critical reflection on our journeys as computing professionals, which aims to inform about the challenges that women encounter and illustrate in a highly personal way the opportunities we can make to address these challenges.
Information and communications technologies (ICTs) provide global connections, communication, and empowerment. Empowerment drives social and economic development. This study, part of an ongoing global study, investigated the use of social technologies including the purposes used and benefits realized in Italy as a means of empowerment for women. Women throughout the world are faced with technological and economic challenges. Italian women are no exception. Women in the workplace were surveyed to determine how technologies are used for business purposes. The results are applicable to entrepreneurs and others in developed and developing countries. Through awareness, education, and the use of social technologies, gender income equality may be achieved as a result of social and economic development.
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is the bedrock for national survival and development in a rapidly changing global environment. Little wonder, every progressive country has a national IT policy and an implementation strategy to respond to the emerging global reality so as to tap from the numerous potential associated with these technologies. However, global reports and statistics reveal that women and girls are grossly underrepresented in the field of ICTs. The International Telecommunications Union (ITU) in 2013 reports that there are currently 200 million fewer women online than men, and this gap could grow to 350 million in three years. The report also reveals that globally women are coming online later and more slowly than men. Out of the world's 2.8 billion Internet users, only 1.3 billion are women. The report also states that women account for fewer than 20% of ICT specialists in developing economies and estimated that, by 2015, 90% of formal employment across all sectors will require ICT skills. The report additionally stated that 21% of women are less likely than their male counterparts to own a mobile phone - representing a mobile gender gap of 300 million. In Africa, only about half of the female population makeup the number of men connected to the internet. This gender divide calls for gender mainstreaming in respect of ICT policy. This chapter examines Nigeria Information Technology Policy and possible areas of encouraging gender mainstreaming in order to encourage and boost the ICT engagement for women empowerment. Thus, having looked at the Gender mainstreaming and Nigeria's IT policy this chapter concludes that there is need for the mainstreaming of the following areas in the IT policy, the issue of access particularly for women to help bridge the gap between men and women, the issue of establishing ICT training centers for women in the rural areas to train them on ICT skills.
This chapter critically reviewed literature on gender disparity associated with access and usage of ICT, focusing on the less developed world, especially Sub- Saharan Africa. The authors used relevant online literature sourced from research databases such as Google Scholar, Elsevier and Wiley Online Library. With the aid of graphical illustrations, the chapter aligned its argument with some critical global research findings regarding gender-based mobile phone and Internet usage and the concept of ICT and gender. The chapter concluded that ICT gender gap negatively affects the socio-economic development of women, and recommended that ICTs manufacturers should integrate gender-balanced software and hardware right at the time of production of the technologies.
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any references for this publication.