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Top1. Introduction
Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) play an essential role in supporting daily life in today's digital society. The policy of the European Union on e-Inclusion aims to ensure that 'no one is left behind' in enjoying the benefits of ICTs. e-Inclusion means both inclusive ICTs and the use of ICTs to achieve wider inclusion objectives. It focuses on participation of all individuals and communities in all aspects of the Information Society1.
The eInclusion concept in the literature has mainly been defined in relation to what has been discussed in the political arena. In this respect, digital inclusion goals have recently been taken further in the context of the Digital Agenda for Europe (DAE), a flagship initiative of the Europe 2020 strategy2. This is of particular importance in today's conditions of financial turmoil and socio-economic crisis in which governments are facing increasing budget constraints and are in search of new ways to address mounting unemployment and limited growth in most European countries (Misuraca et al., JRC-IPTS, 2012).
Here, digital and social inclusion intermediaries can play a crucial role, by providing digital literacy to excluded groups and also by using ICT to advance social inclusion goals for groups at risk. They can help members of groups at risk to acquire new skills or help them to be better positioned to search for employment. Some of these intermediaries - third sector and not-for-profit organisations - play an important role in the eInclusion landscape. However, these actors have received limited policy attention so far, even though there is a growing awareness of their crucial contribution to achieving the goals set out in the DAE.
Research on the role of ICTs in advancing social and economic inclusion goals has a long standing tradition in academia. Although the theoretical origins of this research lie at the intersection between two academic disciplines - communications and development – the last decade has seen research emerging not only from academia but also from policy and action-oriented research institutes and international organizations. This is theoretically diverse and multidisciplinary in nature and not yet consolidated in terms of implications it has for policy and practice (Garrido et al., JRC-IPTS, 2012).
In particular, not enough is known about the role of intermediary actors in improving socio-economic inclusion, the social needs they fulfill and the impact of their programmes on the communities and groups they serve. In 2012, therefore, the European Commission's Joint Research Centre, Institute for Prospective Technological Studies (JRC-IPTS) launched a research project on Measuring the Impact of eInclusion Intermediary Actors (MIREIA3). One of the objectives4 of MIREIA is to map and characterize the eInclusion intermediary actors active in Europe in order to better understand who these eInclusion actors are, which services they provide to which targets groups, how they operate and innovate, and how they can be classified. At the same time, it also aims to suggest a plausible estimate of the size and distribution of the eInclusion actors in Europe.
This article's rationale is therefore based on the need to better understand and characterise the diverse set of actors involved in implementing e-Inclusion policies in Europe. The main research questions addressed by this part of the study are: who are eInclusion Intermediary actors, how do they work and how do they have an impact on digital and social inclusion policy goals?