An e-Training Support Program for Regional and Local Development

Digital Divide

The term digital divide or digital gap is the distance, in terms of socio-economic factors, among individuals, families/households, enterprises and geographical regions with regard to their opportunities for accessing Information Technology and Communications (ICTs) and to their use of the Internet for a wide variety of activities (OECD, 2001) –translating into their difficulty in entering a wide spectrum of activities (Gurstein, 2003). The majority of studies define three general categories:

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  The world divide between developed and developing world (James, 2005; Wade, 2004): technologically and industrially developed nations versus countries with lack of elementary infrastructure.

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  The divide between countries: strategic advantage acquisition in sectors such as economy, army, energy etc. The result is the creation of specific strong political or economic lobbies in decision-making and policies implementation.

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  The inter-social divide within a state -it is also referred to as the ‘technological divide’ or ‘the lack of digital inclusion’ (Rice, 2001): differences between big urban centers and rural regions (Rao, 2005); or, between educated and not educated people, upper or lower class, financially independent or dependent, men and women etc. Age, sex, location, culture, social position and personal or political beliefs are, in general, parameters that can cause an individual to abstain from or not, to be given an option for or not, in technological evolution.