Women in the information world
Rajesh Kumar Aggarwal

Gender and the Digital Economy: Perspectives from the Developing World
ed. Cecilia Ng and Swasti Mitter.
Sage Publications. Pages 262. Rs 540.

Digital economy means the economy in the world of information and communication technologies (ICTs). The book focuses on different issues on the positive aspects of this economy, as these relate to women in the developing world. It contains revised and updated version of papers published earlier in the journal, Gender, Technology and Development (GTD).

It illustrates with case studies from Argentina, Morocco, India, Malaysia and the Philippines how economic empowerment through the ICTs can change the position of women within their families and workplace even in the face of uneven development. The book explores the measures that can make these new gains sustainable and replicable.

Swasti Mitter, the editor, highlights barriers linked to globalisation, which women get to face more.

Regardless of numerous job opportunities by way of Internet trading, call centers, medical transcription, teleworking, the language (English) remains a barrier for women in most developing countries. Women are less visible in specialised jobs or office backup operations and are concentrated in areas where routine or discretionary skills are required.

Czarina Saloma-Akpedonu examines the concept of female spaces, gender relations within Philippines society, and discusses the creation of female spaces in Philippines ICT sector. It argues that ICT industry in Philippines discourages gender tracking in the compensation structure. Indian IT sector employs over eight hundred thousand workers and women constitute 21 per cent of this, which is higher than the overall female work participation rate in the country

Citing examples from Delhi and Bangalore, the authors cite how single women have lesser constraints compared to married women in terms of mobility, working in night shifts, living alone in cities and controlling their income. Cecilia Ng and Mitter, in their essay, examine the situation in Malaysia and India and evaluate to what extent jobs in information technology enabled services (ITES), particularly call centers, have brought benefits. New challenges to women workers in the two countries have also been examined.

Call centers are instrumental in bringing about an improvement in women’s confidence by upgrading their communication skills, mental growth, boldness, and self-confidence, but at the same time, these have increased their stress level due to inconvenient timings, job insecurity, undue quotas and targets. Susan Schaefer Davis shows how rural Moroccan women have been selling their rugs on the Internet since November 2001 and keeping a larger share of final profit that went earlier to middlemen.

The last part deals with the politics and policies of gender and the ICTs and explores the possibilities of implementing changes at the macro level as well as within the institutions. The other papers point at the conceptual framework for promotion of gender equality and women’s empowerment.

Despite a lack of availability of adequate information on many aspects, this book raises some pertinent issues relating to women in the new emerging ICT world. Many of these issues would be of direct interest to the researchers, NGOs, corporate sector and trade unions. It serves as a good source of information for gender sensitisation, particularly in terms of economic and social consequences of digitisation.

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