Posted: February 21st, 2022

The digital divide

The digital divide
The example of my choice pertains to the use of mobile phones. Currently, there are over 6.5 billion active mobile phone subscriptions across the globe (Goldsmith 45). In most cases, individuals who do not have adequate shelter, food, education, and medical services can access mobile phones and the internet. Nonetheless, the cost associated with mobile technology is punitively high because a considerable percentage of income may be dedicated to costs associated with mobile phone usage (Ahas 20). For this reason, the use of mobile technologies may be higher in countries with higher income compared to low-income countries. In addition, individuals with higher incomes may use mobile technologies more compared to people with lower incomes. In this case, the who is the poor individual, the which is the income, the what is the mobile phones, and the how is the usage. Therefore, the poor individual may fail to use the mobile phone because he/she may not afford the costs associated with it due to his/her low income.
The 5 types of instrumental freedoms include political freedoms, economic facilities, social opportunities, protective security and transparency guarantees (Sen 111). The example mentioned above relates to economic facilities. Economic facilities denote to opportunities that people respectively enjoy using economic resources for the aim of consumption, or exchange or production (Sen 111). As such, economic entitlements that an individual has will rely on the resources that an individual owns. Ownership of mobile technologies make it possible for people to access certain products such as loan products, global markets etc. Therefore, poor people who cannot afford mobile phones are denied these economic opportunities. The example also relates to social opportunities. Social opportunities denote to the arrangements made by society for healthcare, education, etc, which impact a person’s substantive freedom to live better (Sen 111). Lack of mobile phones can be a main barrier to participation in economic activities, which may in turn hinder the person’s access to important services such as healthcare and education.

Works Cited
Ahas, Rein, et al. “Using mobile positioning data to model locations meaningful to users of
mobile phones.” Journal of urban technology 17.1 (2018): 3-27.
Goldsmith, Andrea. Wireless communications. Cambridge university press, 2018.
Sen, Amartya. Development as freedom. John Wiley & Sons, 2016.

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