Empowerment of the Rural Poor through Access to ICT: A Case Study of the Union Information and Service Centre Initiative in Bangladesh

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between information and communication technology (ICT) access and the empowerment of rural people through the Union Information and Service Centres (UISCs) established at the Union Council, the lowest administrative unit of the Bangladeshi government. Based on ethnographic research that explores both everyday peoples’ and beneficiary perspectives, this study reveals that given the conditions of poverty, the illiterate and relatively powerless majority of the rural poor failed to access and use the facilities provided through UISCs, which were inevitably controlled by the power elites in the service area. The study concludes that while access to and use of relevant information is a key component of empowerment, the way UISCs have been organized in a particular kind of socio-economic arrangement, the services delivered neither succeeded in providing equality of access nor has the information available through these centres been deemed relevant to promoting rural investment or reducing social disparity in any significant way. This article argues that empowerment from ICTs does not follow automatically after their implementation, but rather the success of technologies and their access is subject to power relationships within communities.