Female empowerment and development in latin america: Use versus production of information and communications technology

In 1992 the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) arst highlighted technology as a tool for human development, and the more recent Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have recognized the important role that ICT can play in the aght against global poverty and as an effective tool to help achieve the MDGs (Information and Communication Technology for Development, UNDP). Furthermore, nearly all national governments have addressed technology in some fashion as a national imperative for sustainable development. Heeks (2008) has noted that the construction of the Internet and the MDGs gave rise to what he has called ICT4D 1.0, the arst phase of a process to link ICTs with development goals by implementing technology as a tool for development, usually in the form of telecenters, and creating ICT access for the poor. Women’s empowerment is also thematic as a policy initiative to promote development. Gender is considered a cross-cutting theme of the MDGs, and the afth goal calls for gender equality and the empowerment of women. ICTs, as stated by the 2003 World Summit on the Information Society in Geneva, are a key tool to promote this empowerment. The previous issue of this journal (Volume 4, Issue 2) presented several successful projects and research andings in the area of ICTs, women, and development. To follow up and expand on this important area of IT and development, this paper suggests two approaches, rather than one, for conceptualizing ICTs and the empowerment of women. In the arst two sections of the paper we argue that a distinction can and should be made between women as users and as producers of ICTs. We follow this with a brief review of how this might apply to Latin America, providing policy and research suggestions for this region as well as other developing regions of the world.