Are African Women Online Just Ict Consumers?

Abstract

/ As Africa's women struggle to enlarge their spheres of influence in political, economic and social arenas, the question is whether the Internet and other digital technologies can become agents of transformation or will reproduce the inequalities of the status quo. This study investigates the sites where gender, class and international trade intersect with the emerging communications technologies, thus epitomizing the ambiguities of globalization. The author overviews Internet development projects currently under way in Africa in general and Senegal in particular, revealing the interconnectedness of governmental and non-governmental initiatives with private capital interests. She argues that the impact of communication technologies in the developing world can only be understood within this web of contingencies, and that neither a naive celebration of ICT potential nor condemnation of a new digital colonialism adequately captures the situation.