Risk Factors, Health, Education, and Poverty

Other complicating and risk factors are introduced to show the extent of interdependencies between health and education. The situation of women and children, besides the series of risks and uncertainties faced, impose more advanced coordination schemes. Accounting for these risks can ensure good conditions for the use of different ICT components. New means and strategies for mobilizing ICTs2 either for databases or software tools and empirical analyses are also important when considering the process of accounting for interdependencies. However, the enhancement of literacy in each economy appears to be conditioning the success of Internet penetration.

ICTs and Coordination for Poverty Alleviation

In recent decades, calls for poverty alleviation have increased significantly in both developed and developing countries. Relatively, ICTs have been viewed as offering helpful tools for poverty reduction. This chapter investigates access to ICTs in the context of poverty, in both developed and developing countries. Based on a sample of 40 countries (20 developing and 20 developed countries), several statistical tests have been performed with promising results obtained. It is first shown that people in developing countries have less access to ICTs relative to those in developed countries. Second, it is also proven that the use of Internet is positively affected by the literacy rate within a country. The higher the literacy rate, the higher the number of Internet users in a country. The third result conveys that countries with higher GDP per capita ensure higher access to ICTs for their populations. Finally, this chapter proposes that populations of countries with higher poverty rates have less access to ICTs.

Social Deficits, Social Cohesion, and Prospects from ICTs

This chapter investigates the multiplicity of the social deficits occurring in most Arab countries. It also assesses the extent and magnitude of such deficits and looks at their interactions. Further needs for human development and social cohesion1 are discussed as means and policies that can alleviate these shortages and create new avenues for enhanced and coordinated development. The Millennium Development Goals pursued by developing countries, represent a promising framework that is targeting 2015 for the attainment of the objectives. This chapter identifies the main directions of social deficits as they relate to health, education, and poverty, with a focus on the Arab economies. The potential provided by the Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) in the coordination of the alleviation of the social deficits are also discussed. ICTs are then recognized as important sources for the improvement of identification, extent, and the use of the policy tools for poverty reduction. The framework of social cohesion is also placed in parallel with human development through a discussion of policies needed to reduce deprivation.

Women Empowerment and ICTs in Developing Economies

The revolution in Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) has vast implications for the developing world; yet this revolution is associated with several issues. One of the main issues is the gender digital divide that has been widely growing in these economies. The absence of clear knowledge about the ways gender inequality and ICTs are impacting each other remain a main issue of ICTs and women. This chapter examines some issues and challenges related to women and ICTs in developing economies. The chapter discusses some potential uses of ICTs for women empowerment. Finally, real case studies of the use of ICTs for women empowerment in developing countries are introduced to show that local development projects can benefit from technological support.

Insights to the Interconnections of Health, Education, and Other Wealth Components

This chapter is devoted to showing the levels of manifestation of interconnections in the area of economic and social development with a focus on health, education, and other wealth components. It describes the existing interconnections between different assets, which are health, education, and social capital, besides traditional economic factors owned by individuals, groups, and economies. The chapter is mainly based on a review of the previous literature that has looked at one or several dimensions of these interconnections. This covers the interdependencies that have been described in the context of specific world regions. The outcomes from this chapter prepare one for the coming chapters on the role of ICTs in coordination.

Need of a Balance between Fragmented and Coordinated Decision-Making

This chapter looks at fragmentation and implications in different decision-making contexts with a focus on new technology and enterprise creation in developing economies. Coordination is introduced as the response to external effects of fragmented and scattered decisions. The most important features of this framework are captured under a simplified theoretical economic model. The evidence on economic sectors is provided in the literature review, but the data from “Doing Business” of the World Bank is used to test for the high costs implied by the implicit scattering and fragmentation of decisions related to enterprise creation. The attained results either from access to new technologies or from the empirical analysis of “Doing Business” data show the prevalence of anti-commons and fragmentation in developing economies. This points out how anti-commons and fragmentation can limit development through reducing business expansion and social benefits, even when national and international institutions exhibit clear intentions for coordination.

Implications of the Findings and Prospects for Further Coordination

This last chapter summarizes the most important findings from the previous chapters of this book. It places emphasis on fragmentation and scatted decisions as likely sources of economic and social inefficiencies when externalities or interdependencies are present. Coordination, including government interventions, is underlined to be the means for re-establishing economic and social benefits. In this context, new technologies and especially ICTs can be important inputs for better coordination and enhancement of the levels of the overall social benefits. However, further research is needed to identify the levels of causality besides all the factors that influence the access to health, education, and socioeconomic outcomes in different contexts and situations. The economies in the South Mediterranean Countries (SMC), Middle East, and North Africa, besides the Arab countries are shown having to account for further interdependencies between health, education, and the socioeconomic situations. The roles and impacts of ICTs are found to be promising for the achievement of higher socioeconomic performances.

Socioeconomic Reforms, Human Development, and the Millennium Development Goals with ICTs for Coordination

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) is an international effort engaging all countries and mainly the developing ones towards the reduction of health, education, and other deficits by 2015. Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) have contributed to this global undertaking through the creation of further coordination, evaluation, and monitoring. Their roles can be expanded to better coordinate local and national actions with the overall international efforts. Based mainly on previous findings from available literature, the present chapter illustrates how ICTs have been promoted to ensure these coordination functions.

ICTs and Socioeconomic Performance with Focus on ICTs and Health

This chapter shows how interconnections do exist within the same sector and how ICTs can provide useful coordinating functions in the sector of health care. This is based on how e-health and other technological variants have been developing around the world and how these are promoting further access to the overall chain of health care. An overall quantitative assessment of the relationships between variables related to health and independent variables representing ICTs are established using multiple regression. The attained results show that statistically significant relationships do globally exist between health improvements and further access to information technologies. These relationships are promising for ensuring further use of advanced technologies in the area of health care in general. While there are variations between countries, the great inputs from advanced technologies in health care appear to be globally promising. Coordination between different players in this area is in the process of showing enhanced outputs at the level of health care and its related channels.

The Triple Helix as a Model for Coordination with Potential for ICTs

Promising frameworks have been developed to ensure that different players can have benefits from economic and social activities with high levels of interdependencies. Among these frameworks, the triple helix model constitutes an interesting model that accounts for interactions and ensures coordination of tasks. This chapter focuses on both the elements of the framework and its applications. A special focus is placed on knowledge diffusion in MENA and Arab countries. The usefulness of the triple helix coordinating process is clearly shown to be a way of accounting for interferences and interdependencies. The implicit idea is that further requirements of coordination under this model need further use of ICT tools.