Year: 2021
Type: book-review
Abstract: Perhaps because by the 2010s four in five people were using the Internet in many regions of the world, the digital divide appeared fixed. This book, however, is a reminder of the continued social relevance of inequalities in access to, use of, and outcomes of digital information and communication technologies – ‘the problem only starts when everybody has a computer, smartphone or Internet connection!’ (p. 47, emphasis in original). The Digital Divide is next in line in a series of impactful book-length treatments of the subject by Pippa Norris (2001), Mark Warschauer (2003), Jan Van Dijk (2005), and James Witte and Susan Mannon (2010). Van Dijk’s overarching, empirically well-founded diagnosis is that the digital divide reflects and often reinforces social inequality.
Source: New Media & Society
Author: Moritz Büchi
Institution: University of Zurich
Language: English
Subfield: General Social Sciences
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
SDG: Reduced inequalities
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W3133889216