In the discourse on information and communications technologies (ICTs), the focus has been on the, sometimes negative, relocation of jobs from the developed world. This book focuses, instead, on the positive aspects of the introduction of ICTs and shows how they can empower women and make a difference in today's uneven development process. It illustrates, with case studies from Argentina, Morocco, India, Malaysia and the Philippines, how economic empowerment can change the position of women within their families and workplaces. This book shows how to: - distinguish between liberal and neo-liberal theoretical paradigms while analyzing `informational capitalism'; - interrogate the silence and ambiguity among scholars and practitioners regarding gender equality, ICTs and human development; - avoid imposing canons of Western feminism in assessing the benefits of e-trade in societies where social norms are different; and - incorporate feminist principles of inclusion, user-developer interaction and transparency while designing ICT initiatives. Gender and the Digital Economy is an excellent resource for academic researchers, NGOs and industry analysists in the field of international development communication.

Author Biography

Cecilia Ng is Visiting Associate Professor at the Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok (Thailand). Earlier, she was Associate Professor at Universiti Putra, Selangor (Malaysia) and Research Fellow at the United Nations University Institute for New Technologies, Maastricht (The Netherlands). Cecilia has conducted research and published widely on gender, development and work, with a focus on globalization, technological change and women's employment. She is an editor of the journal Gender, Technology and Development. Swasti Mitter is an international consultant on information and communication technologies (ICT) and gender. She was Chair of Gender and Technology at the University of Brighton, Brighton (UK) and Deputy Director of the United Nations University Institute for New Technologies, Maastricht (The Netherlands). She has been a Visiting Fellow at the Science Policy Research Institute of the University of Sussex, Brighton (UK), and at the Center for Women's Studies at University of California, Los Angeles (USA). She has published widely on women and technology, and has advised major UN agencies and the World Bank.