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Abstract
This paper reviews debates, approaches, and discourses on gender, technology and development. The aim is to contribute towards the understanding of the nature, concerns and contributions of ongoing research in the gender, information communication and technology for development field. It outlines the major themes and methodological approaches to the field by reviewing and calling for changes in the theoretical and empirical directions of this area of study. It concludes with analysis of major themes emanating from the field.
Acknowledgements
The author would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their constructive comments, as well as helpful comments from Elizabeth Asiedu and Francis Owusu.
Notes
The ICT4D literature emerged over the last 10 years, to establish the link between ICTs and economic and social development.
ICTs are defined broadly as ‘technologies to access, process and transmit information’ (Weigel & Waldburger Citation2004, p. 19). There are distinctions made between old and new ICTs. Old ICTs referred to as traditional media include radio, telephones, television and radios. New ICTs are mostly Internet based such as computers, email, online and mobile technologies. This distinction is maintained in the paper.
Gender digital divide is the unequal access of men and women to ICTs. This divide exists in both rich and poor nations, but the gap is wider in poor nations.
The WID paradigm features highly in the link between technology, gender and development. WID analysis favors technological determinism and the role of experts. It shows underpinnings of the modernization school that privilege the role of technology and experts in development.
‘A Telecenter provides information technology and telecommunications facilities, user support and training for members of a community who cannot afford such facilities on an individual basis and or do not have the skills to use such tools’ (Ernberg Citation1998, p. 191).
Technological determinism assumes that technology is the engine of progress in society and will solve all development problems in society (Wajcman Citation1991, Citation2004, Citation2006; Jasanoff et al. Citation1995; MacKenzie & Wajcman Citation1999).
Speech given at the 2003 WSIS. Available at: http://www.Geneva2003.org:// www.Geneva2003.org.
As defined by Worsley Citation(1970), the third world constitutes countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America that were colonized.
Media Studies concentrates on the role of mass communications in society.
AMARC is an international NGO that promotes social change through the development of a strong community radio sector.
Gender is seen as the process by which individuals who are born into biological categories of male or female become social categories of men and women through the acquisition of locally-defined attributes of masculinity and femininity (Kabeer Citation1994, p. 11).