New technologies, young people and social inclusion

Abstract

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have long been promoted as a particularly apposite means of allowing young people to play active roles in society, enhancing educational and employment prospects and, crucially, offering ways in which ‘previously marginalised’ young people “might better participate in public culture and democracy” (Schofield Clark 2003, p.98). All told, an “intrinsically equitable, decentralised and democratic world” (Graham 2002, p.35) is anticipated by many commentators, with young people technologically re-positioned at its core rather than periphery. Of course, there is a growing sense amongst more critical commentators that these inclusive promises are tempered by persistent ‘digital inequalities’ which replicate and reinforce the familiar ‘social fault lines’ of gender, age, income, race, educational background, geography and disability (Golding 2000). Indeed the Pew study of US internet use bluntly contended that ‘demography is destiny when it comes to going online’ — a conclusion supported by the wealth of digital divide surveys and statistical analyses produced year on year by academics, governments, charitable foundations and market researchers the world over. Broadly speaking these data show that those who are better educated, relatively well-off, urban-dwelling, white and male continue to be more likely to enjoy a higher quality and quantity of ICT access and use (Livingstone 2004, Chinn and Fairlie 2004). In this respect, the key challenge facing policymakers in the early twenty-first century remains how best to address these imperfections of the otherwise idealised information age.