Digital Inclusion: Measuring the Impact of Information and Community Technology

Citation

Paul, J. (2010), "Digital Inclusion: Measuring the Impact of Information and Community Technology", Program: electronic library and information systems, Vol. 44 No. 2, pp. 176-178. https://doi.org/10.1108/00330331011039562

This book is about measuring innovative approaches adopted by CTCs, or Community Technology Organisations, to bridge the needs of the information poor to create a knowledge dividend. Titled Digital Inclusion: Measuring the Impact of Information and Community Technology, edited by Michael Crandall, and Karen E. Fisher with ten other contributors, covers a great deal of territory from the enactment of legislation, to field work findings and a theoretical framework that provides a working model for libraries, government service agencies and community technology centres. The general thrust of the book is to force an alignment between a programme‐oriented assessment of digital inclusion initiatives and an outcome‐based approach. Funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the book confines its experiments to Washington State in the USA and the activities of the Communities Connect Network. While it may seem paradoxical to deliberate on the issue of the digital divide in highly connected communities and regions of the developed world, let alone Washington, this book highlights the gulf between availability and accessibility, highlighting the visible divide. With a Gini index at 0.450 in 2008, the rising income inequality in the United States has created impediments to access and opportunity, even while the community at large is techno‐centric.

 The title is a welcome addition to similar studies focusing on impact evaluation. Fund givers who find existing evaluation paradigms (social capital measurements to contingency evaluation and consumer surplus methodologies) inadequate to address the programme level impact on policy and communities, may find that the situated logic model proposed by the authors offers new possibilities. The action research provides a working framework for thinking about the impact of community technology on effecting knowledge dividends with concrete real‐life examples and case studies. The title will be useful for financial, corporate and strategic planning executives in social and not‐for‐profit institutions seeking to establish priorities and assessment models for digital inclusion initiatives.

The book's chapters number 15 covering three broad areas:

1. 1.

   a background for the study and the work of the Communities Connect Network;

2. 2.

   documented case studies demonstrating impact of CTC's on individuals, family and community; and

3. 3.

   the theoretical framework expositing the situated logic model with a step‐by‐step guide to adopting the framework and a section on web resources for further investigation.

The real‐time narrative of case studies with theoretical dialectic makes the book an interesting read for both academics and practitioners alike. Appended to life‐transforming stories are charts, statistics and info‐graphs that enhance the readability of a highly specialised subject matter. The book carries a short but useful index.

The real‐life examples, some seven cases, are central to the discussion. The selection of the cases is representative of the diversity of “left‐behind” segments of modern techno‐savvy societies. The success of community action in each case is attributed to legislative reform, adequate funding and government support. The case of Washington Community Alliance for Self‐Help (CASH) – building financial assets is particularly interesting. The CTC was designed to enable people from poor economic backgrounds to start their own enterprises, many of which had to rely on market information, suppliers, product and technology roadmaps and government grants/subsidy information online. The case is illustrative of a “successful failure” where resource constraints impede or impose a barrier to active promotion of their quick success. The case brought to the fore the issue of scalability of social programmes.

The most significant contribution of the book in my opinion is its rallying call to align programme outcomes, goals and activities with the broader stakeholder vision and mission. The authors attempt to frame the work of CTCs in the larger policy context. The absence of context mapping to align stakeholder priorities to programme logic and the lack of measures on access to information and resources, have resulted in unintended consequences for most social investments, henceforth the situated logic model that attempts to bridge logic models. At the heart of the model is the activity‐based costing methodology (ABC) applied at the outcome dimension and linked with that of the programme tier. While it would serve organisations that have adopted ABC planning and execution tools well, theoretically it offers an interesting spin on the balance scorecard model where a set of interconnected outcomes are translated to key performance indicators. However, the alignment of inputs, activities, outputs and outcomes at the contextual tier with the programme tier may be more easily theorised than realised, more prohibitive than innovative. Argued entirely from the standpoint of “intended” and planned outcomes, most desirable and innovative returns on social programmes tend to be unplanned and inconceivable at the point of its inception. The “hole‐in‐the‐wall” experiment in India, for example, may not stand the scrutiny of the situated logic model. The case studies discussed in the book do not sufficiently address “minimally invasive educational” technology initiatives where outcomes can be more open‐ended than clearly defined. The empowerment quotient derived out of social programmes is somewhat reduced to a set of pre‐defined competencies spelt out in the outcome and context logic of the situated logic model. Albeit, the investigation highlights the dilemma of social enterprises not being able to keep abreast of policy issues in the community and the lack of tools and approaches at their disposal to establish these broader linkages.

Collective community enhancement as an ideal social outcome is most evident in the cases cited. The Reel‐Girls programme for girls aged 13 to 19 is a case in point. The programme gathers girls from diverse social and ethnic backgrounds to produce video on common teen problems. They have bagged prestigious awards in several festivals which has enhanced their personal self‐esteem and confidence in working with others. The authors conclude that community aided technology adoptions serve higher social goals of employment, social identity and affinity, poverty alleviation and entrepreneurship, which are generally served by governments and therefore warrant a different level of assessment. However, there is insufficient discussion on the sustainability and scalability of such a success, and if the desired impact can be minimally achieved in a completely different setting. Readers would find it difficult to arrive at a conclusive judgement on the applicability of the situated logic model in a different context. A cross‐country, cross institutional comparison would have strengthened the case for the adoption of the model for social enterprises.

The book is priced for institutional purchases and may be too expensive for individual off‐the‐shelf buyers. As it is a seminal piece on a modified approach towards impact assessment, it is inevitable that the ideas articulated in this book will stimulate new investigations.