ABSTRACT
The revolution in IT (including the Internet) presents new opportunities for economic development and social mobility. Yet for many belonging to disadvantaged groups, accessibility to new technologies and economic well-being is highly constrained. This tension manifests itself in increasing inequality, set in motion by the rapidity of innovations, itself let loose by global economic integration and unequal access to new technologies. This chapter examines this tension by identifying the economic and social processes behind inequality in some Asian economies and how that inequality is reproduced in the larger world economy.
