In other words, it's a bit silly to talk about the "digital divide" without also addressing the underlying problems of broken court systems, military rule, confiscatory government policies, and so on that these nations have yet to address. Solving those problems would go a long way to solving any "digital divide" that still remains.
Chuck Sherwood responds:
This is the kind of "knownothing" analysis that is being generated by the World Bank report. Declan's listserv is read by many thought leaders and his analysis will contribute to the general misunderstanding and misinformation about the Digital Divide.
Chuck, I am not sure I see your point? And, if I read Declan's post correctly - or make some rough assumptions? - it could well be that the economic gulf has gotten wider while the digital gulf has gotten more narrow.
The metrics of determination are of course difficult, but let's assume that one of the metrics of "digital prosperity" is how many people are within walking distance of a computer connected to the Net? If we don't talk "trained people who know how to use the computer" and if we don't talk about "trained people who can use the computer to improve their lives" then, from that narrow perspective, the digital divide might have improved greatly in the last few years. i.e. a whole lot more people are now within walking distance of being Net connected, yet many (the bulk?) have unchanged economic situations.
In other words, one gulf got smaller; and the other gulf didn't change - or might even have gotten bigger.
It may take many, many years to provide solidly documented studies that support the idea that when the digital divide is small, the chances of upward economic growth is likely. Yet, even then, we may get lots of chicken and egg caveats.
Sometime back I told the story of a Horacio Alger Taiwanese who made it big in the chicken business. Underpinning his success was use of superior chicken growing technology; but underpinning that was the message that if his customers didn't keep the coops clean, no amount of brilliant technology would fatten up their wallets.
Isn't that what Declan was getting at? That the easy part was the technology. The hard part was good governance. Are we completely sure that once a society has a narrow digital gulf, that good governance will follow?
John Hibbs http://www.bfranklin.edu/johnhibbs
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