Digital Divide Essay

Over the past few decades, the rapid growth of information and communication technology (ICT) has transformed modern society around the globe. However, while Developed countries have long since embraced and benefited from the integration of ICT’s such as the internet into their culture many developing countries are still struggling to follow in their footsteps. As a result they risk becoming left behind in the past while the rest of the world advances creating a gap referred to as the digital divide. As time continues on the divide gets wider and its presence becomes an increasingly vital issue for countries who fail to adapt to the growing digital world. However, in order to do this other issues must be addressed as well. There are several socio-cultural obstacles to the adoption and final acceptance of the internet in third world countries.

In order to simplify the definition of the digital divide it can be divided into two core categories, the access digital divide and the social digital divide (2). The access digital divide refers to the divide between those who do and don’t have physical access to computers or the internet. A wide variety of factors are used in correlation with this term including economic, geographical and technical. The social digital divide refers to the social or physiological factors that prevent someone from using the internet such as education, race, age, gender, and cultural differences. Although many third world countries have overcome the access divide, the social divide continues to prevent them from adopting the internet.

But why is integration of the internet important for third world countries?

When measuring the causes of the digital divide in third world countries demographics such as age, ...

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... lack the knowledge to use it. According to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNEA), “African countries experience the lowest literacy rates in the world.” Without the proper recourses for a proper education such as knowledgable teachers, updated materials, and learning materials student attending often receive a very poor quality of eduction. Many students choose to never even attend school because their time could be better spent helping out at home or they simply don’t see the point of going. Even the students who do attend are often done with their education while still in their teenage years. In developed countries the youth which make up almost half of the population and contain the greatest potential in pulling their country out of poverty continue to end up on the streets of rural areas plugged with illness, teen pregnancy, and little hope.