I recently read the draft of a paper by Michel Menou "IsICTometrics*:
Toward an alternative vision and process" to be presented at RICYT &
Observatório das Ciências e das Tecnologias (OCT), Portugal, Seminar on
Indicators of The Information Society and Scientific Culture Lisbon, 25-27
June 2001 in which he proposes a methodology to examine the extent and the
effects of ICT penetration. It would be an excellent thing if such an
examination were to become possible.
It seems to me that, as well as the "digital divide", there is also a
"perception/comprehension divide" between those of us who are in effect
"connection boxes" joining ICT and the South in the South, and those at
the other end of the "bridge" where ICT sets out from the North. In a
recent message John Lawrence wrote in reply to Michel Menou (July 16th):
> What if we reverse your proposition.... what is the evidence of
> negative effects of the Internet....? where has access to Internet hurt
> net (plus-minus) development, of the individual, or the society?
This is frightening, particularly in the context of President Bush's
recent statements that his major concern is the health of the US economy.
"Not doing harm" CANNOT be equated with "doing good", particularly where
resources are small with a hundred worthwhile claims for every cent. In
the June 2001 issue of Popular Science there is an article by Chris
O'Malley "Low-Tech Blues" in which he describes a good deal of wonderful
technology that really doesn't work properly. Some of this technology is
what Northern experts propose that the South should invest in.
Perhaps the most useful thing that mechanisms like this list could do is
to identify technology solutions which work and which bring demonstrable
benefits (Frederick Noronha and his colleagues are doing this already as a
volunteer exercise) and stop insisting that universal access to computers
is going to solve all the problems.
Do what the economists have at last conceded may be the sensible way to go
- consult the poor and ask THEM to define their poverty.
Best wishes,
Deirdre Williams
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