Gerard Goggin guest lecture for Online Media MECO 3620

1. Internet Policy and Inclusion
Guest Lecture for
Online Media MECO 3620
Gerard Goggin/@ggoggin
Dept of Media & Communications, USYD
Week 11, 09.10.2017

2. Internet law & policy & governance now covers a
wide range of areas (cf. Terry Flew)
- Well beyond older concepts in media & communications (set out in Broadcasting
legislation or frameworks for regulating the press)
- Well beyond telecommunications concepts (set out in Telecommunications Act)
- well beyond ‘classic’ topics in Internet governance (e.g. Domain Name registration)
- Intellectual property
- privacy & surveillance (especially after the Snowden leaks)
- data & algorithms
- Implications of the Internet of Things (e.g. a highly pervasive Internet embedded in many
everyday devices and environments)
This has led to calls for Internet rights; bill of rights etc

3. Brazil’s 2015
‘Marco Civil da
Internet’ ( or ’Bill
of Rights’)
Source: Caroline Rossini;
https://advox.globalvoices.org/wpcontent/uploads/
2014/03/marcocivilja.jpg

4. central, overarching issue in
Internet law, policy & governance is
technology &
inequality
a.k.a. digital inequality; digital inclusion; digital
exclusion; digital divide

5. United Nations, Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) 2015

6. Sustainable Development Goal 9. Build resilient infrastructure,
promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and foster
innovation
Target 9.c: Significantly increase access to information and
communications technology and strive to provide universal and
affordable access to the Internet in least developed countries by 2020
Indicator 9.c.1: Proportion of population covered by a mobile network,
by technology
• See metadata
(SDC Indicators Metadata repository, 17 July 2017)

9. ‘Researchers engaged in critical scholarship—those
concerned with power asymmetries and their
consequences—have long been aware that
inequality and social injustice abound in the world
and that digitally mediated communication is a
contributing factor.
However, instrumental traditions of research—those
offering solutions to narrowly defined questions
about how social and economic inequality is
generated rather than why it occurs—have also
examined the role of digital technologies.’
Robin Mansell, ‘Inequality & Digitally Mediated Communication’, 2017, p. 148

11. digital divide research traditions (as per Mansell)
1. Access
2. Skills, literacies, competencies (cf. Van Dijck 2013)
3. Outcomes of connectivity
key messages from digital divide traditions (Mansell, 2017,
p. 150)
• ‘socio-cultural, political and economic factors are associated with the way
people experience the digital environment’
• ‘complexity of the relationship between digital technology and economic,
political and social factors, a relationship that is further complicated when
studies focus on the local or national level’
• ‘Historical differentiations shape the way digitally mediated
communication is experienced in different societies’
• Experience of digital technology is influenced by the “general circumstance
of an individual’s life” (Wessels 2013, 26)

12. Australian Internet & inclusion?
• longstanding traditions of research/debate/discourse
regarding: 1. technology & inequality; 2. access &
equity in relation to media & communications
• Late 1980s-early 1990s: universal service in
telecommunications
• mid-1990s Oz policymakers became concerned about
Internet access & ABS began gathering statistics
• Most recent research is Digital Inclusion Index 2016
(produced by Julian Thomas & colleagues & Telstra)

15. • Overall, digital inclusion is growing in Australia
• The gaps between digitally included and excluded Australians are
substantial and widening
• Access continues to improve
• Digital Ability remains an area for further improvement
• Affordability remains a challenge for some excluded groups, although value
has improved
• Mobile-only users are less digitally included
• The ‘age gap’ is substantial and widening
• Women are less digitally included, particularly those aged 65+
• Indigenous digital inclusion is low, but improving
• Some Australians are particularly digitally excluded
• Geography plays a critical role (‘Capital-Country Gap’)
JulianThomas et al., Measuring Australia’s Digital Divide: Australian Digital
Inclusion Index 2017, Executive Summary, pp. 5-6

16. The Digital Inclusion score
‘The ADII is designed to
measure three key
aspects, or dimensions, of
digital inclusion:
Access,
Affordability, and
Digital Ability.’
Thomas et al., Measuring Australia’s
Digital Divide, p. 8

17. ‘Australia: The National
Picture 2017’, Thomas
et al., Measuring
Australia’s Digital
Divide, p. 9

18. Measuring Australia’s Digital Divide 2016
report
‘For people with disability, digital inclusion is low, but improving
steadily. People with disability have a low level of digital inclusion
(44.4, or 10.1 points below the national average). However, nationally,
their inclusion has improved steadily (by 2.6 points since 2014),
outpacing the national average increase (1.8 points).’
Definition of ‘disability’: ‘Disability: people in this category receive
either a disability pension, or the disability support pension’ (p. 7)
Thomas, J, Barraket, J, Ewing, S, MacDonald, T, Mundell, M & Tucker, J 2016, Measuring
Australia’s Digital Divide: The Australian Digital Inclusion Index 2016, Swinburne University
of Technology, Melbourne, for Telstra.

19. ‘Over three years,
Access scores increased for … people with disability
(up 4.6 points) [cf. 4.1 points nationally]
Digital Ability also increased for … people with
disability (up 7.7 points) [cf 3.6 points nationally]
Affordability index number fell markedly for seniors
(down 6.8 points) and people in the Q4 income bracket
(down 8 points), and also declined for Indigenous
people (down 4.7 points) and people with disability
(down 4.4 points).’
Thomas, J, Barraket, J, Ewing, S, MacDonald, T, Mundell, M & Tucker, J
2016, Measuring Australia’s Digital Divide: The Australian Digital
Inclusion Index 2016, Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne,
for Telstra.

20. ‘Any such dialogue [consequences of contemporary
digital technology innovation] must focus on what
human beings will do in their lives in the future and
how they will live together with authority and dignity.
This must be a dialogue about what people value in
their lives when they are mediated by digital
technologies, not simply about the values that come to
be embedded in technologies as they emerge from
laboratory. It is urgent that such a dialogue is
undertaken, that it is inclusive and that choices are
acted upon.’
Robin Mansell, 2017, p. 157

21. • Socially shaped, disability spans a wide variety of different bodies, conditions, and
situations; we can find themselves more or less “disabled,” identifying or dis-
identifying with disability, through the course of our lives;
• In relation to technology, there are many ways in which barriers, obstacles, and
inaccessibility can be “built-in” systems, rather than producing “enabling”
environments
• Disability has an especially close association with design, offering many ways to
rethink “universal” and “inclusive design”;
• Disability also involves new aspects of literacy, education, and user support,
requiring accessible formats, inclusive education, as well as drawing attention to
cultural and linguistic aspects of digital inequality
• There is a high incident of people with disabilities in the “majority world”, or
“global south” - yet many of the proffered solutions for global connectivity, such
as cheap mobile phones, fall well short of meeting the needs, preferences, and
desires of users with disabilities;
• people with disabilities are marginalized in the research, policy, technology
design, and policy formulation relating to digital inequality.
Goggin, Gerard. “Disability and Digital Inequalities: Rethinking Digital Divides with Disability Theory.” In Theorizing Digital
Divides, edited by Massimo Ragnedda and Glenn Muschert, 63-74.

24. Do we have a map of digital citizenship in
NSW?
• How does each person and household gain affordable, accessible access
to & use of accessible technology? (e.g. what role is played by NSW tech
industry & ecosystem; employers; NDIS system & providers in assistive
tech; Fed govt in universal service; anti-discrimination/human rights law;
state gov & agencies; local govt; community groups; education
institutions?)
• How does everyone learn the basics about digital technology? across
different groups/demographics in communities, especially addressing
distinct requirements across families; communities; schools; work;
institutional settings;
• How do we ensure everyone has access to training & support for new
kinds of digital technology? E.g. to access ‘digital’ government services
(paying bills; licence renewals) Often community groups, libraries, local
governments provide/support such training/support

25. Map of digital citizenship in NSW?
• What say do citizens have in introduction & operation of digital
technologies? (e.g. what are the governance arrangements for data
gathering & digital services in ‘smart’ cities currently being
developed?)
• Policies for intersectional digital citizenship (e.g. what the concepts
& needs of disability digital citizenship that come from innovative use
in particular communities – cultural diverse, indigenous, rural &
remote communities, gender & sexually diverse communities?)
• Digital citizenship across the ‘life course’ (e.g. what about mandating
Wi-Fi access in nursing homes & care facilities for older people?)

28. Further reading
Goggin, Gerard, Scott Hollier, and Wayne Hawkins. “Internet Accessibility and
Disability Policy: Lessons for Digital Inclusion from Australia.” Internet Policy
Review 6.1 (2017)
Goggin, Gerard. “Reimagining Digital Citizenship via Disability.” In
Negotiating Digital Citizenship: Control, Contest, Culture, edited by Anthony
McCosker, Sonja Vivienne, and Amelia Johns, 61-80 (Rowman & Littefield,
2016 )
Nick Couldry et al. “Media and Communication.” Chapter 13, Report on
International Panel on Social Progress, Cambridge University Press, 2017, in
press; draft at https://comment.ipsp.org/chapter/chapter-13-media-and-
communications