ABSTRACT
This chapter advances the novel point of view that the digital divide needs to be conceptualized and measured not only between unweighted averages of rich and poor countries but also in terms of all global citizens, regardless of where they live. For this purpose there is a need to know not only the income levels of those who use the Internet, but also whether and to what extent they can be described as living in poverty (as measured, for instance, by $1 a day). After all, much of the literature on IT and development is concerned to emphasize the positive influence of this technology on poverty and the Millennium Development Goals more generally. Recently, for example, UNCTAD (2006: 169) argued that ‘Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have opened up new opportunities to alleviate poverty and have changed the way in which poverty reduction efforts take place’. In the same year, an ITU report referred to the World Summit on the Information Society meeting held in Tunis, highlighting the potential of ICTs to ‘improv[e] the socio-economic development of all human beings’ and pointing to the ‘growing importance of the role of ICTs … as a tool for the achievement for the internationally-agreed development goals and objectives, including the Millennium Development Goals’ (ITU 2006b: 3).
