Commissioned Book Review: Massimo Ragnedda and Anna Gladkova, Digital Inequalities in the Global South
| Author | Arjun Tremblay |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/14789299221077811 |
| Published date | 01 May 2023 |
| Date | 01 May 2023 |
| Subject Matter | Commissioned Book Review |
Political Studies Review
2023, Vol. 21(2) NP9 –NP10
journals.sagepub.com/home/psrev
Commissioned Book Review
1077811PSW0010.1177/14789299221077811Political Studies ReviewCommissioned Book Review
book-review2022
Commissioned Book Review
Digital Inequalities in the Global South
edited by Massimo Ragnedda and Anna
Gladkova. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan,
2021, 372 USD 84.99, ISBN 9783030327088.
Critiques of information and communication
technologies (ICTs) in the Global North are
starting to mount in light of the continued use of
the web and social media in spreading conspiracy
theories and far-right propaganda and due to the
damage that these technologies are doing as
tools for the dissemination of false information
about the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, when it
concerns countries of the Global South, the
implementation and development of ICTs is
viewed quite differently. For these countries,
the spread of highspeed Internet, access to
social media platforms, and the implementation
of e-government tend to be seen as necessary
conditions for economic development and
democratization. It is precisely this difference
in perspective and an implicit “techno-evangelist
and Western-centered approach” (p. 3) to ICTs
that the editors of Digital Inequalities in the
Global South—Massimo Ragnedda and Anna
Gladkova—and the volume’s contributors se t
out to challenge. In brief, this timely and
eclectic volume, comprising 16 chapters and a
brief afterword, explores the promise and
problems associated with ICTs in South Asia,
Central and Western Asia, Africa, and South
America. In so doing, several key chapters
contribute to a new research agenda which does
not assume a priori that ICTs are inherently
emancipatory.
One of Digital Inequalities’ key contribu-
tions to this new research agenda can be found
in chapter 2 (Ragnedda and Gladkova). This
chapter provides a succinct yet comprehensive
review of the literature on the development and
implementation of ICTs and the digital divide in
the Global South and it is essential reading for
any future study on ICTs. In a few short pages,
the volume’s editors provide an overview of the
evolving discussion on analyses of the digital
divide, which they contend should now entail
not only examinations of first level digital
divides (i.e. unequal access to ICTs on a global
scale) and second level digital divides (i.e.
unequal usage of ICTs when they become
widely available domestically) but also, and
perhaps most critically, an assessment of third
level digital divides (i.e. unequal outcomes
generated by widely available ICTs). The
chapter also identifies significant deficiencies
in existing research—most notably an implicit
assumption that the Global South’s experience
with ICTs is invariant—as well as a critical
need to further understand how third level
digital divides are playing out in and across
countries of the Global South.
Several of the chapters in Section 1 of Digital
Inequalities (“Digital Inequalities in South
Asia”) suggest that there may be a particular
value in applying qualitative methods and
engaging in small scale studies when examining
the complexities of digital divides. For example,
Chapter 3 (Acharya) employs “inductive cate-
gory development” to show that, while Nepal is
addressing the first level of the digital divide,
basic facets of Nepalese e-government remain
ineffective and unable to redress second and
third levels digital divides. Likewise, Chapter 6
(Ullah) uses the results of in-depth interviews to
demonstrate that, paradoxically, the creation of
Union Digital Centers meant to empower the
rural poor in Bangladesh actually reinforces
existing social stratification. By contrast, the use
of a large-N survey of Internet users in India
presented in Chapter 5 (Rani et al.) to develop
an argument on regional variances in ICT access
and usage is ultimately unconvincing.
Perhaps the most important contribution
made by Digital Inequalities to the development
of a new research agenda comes in the form of
the compelling yet unresolved puzzles, each of
which opens up important avenues for future
research. For instance, Chapter 7 (Kreitem) points
to the possibility that redressing digital divides
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