The Impact of the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on Gender Equality and Development

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of the information and communication technology (ICT) on gender equality and development. Especially, after the 1990s, ICT became very popular and commonly expected that it has direct and indirect impact on gender equality through different channels such as internet, computers, and mobiles etc. Both theoretical and empirical research methods were used in this study. The empirical part of the study consists of two different applications. First, the impact of ICT on gender equality was examined in this study by using dynamic panel data analysis for 209 countries for the period from 2000 to 2010. Empirical results showed that it has positive and significant impact on gender equality. Second, we analysed the impact of gender equality and ICT on child development by using crosscountry data by taking the average values of variables on 137 countries. It showed that the improvement in gender equality and access to ICTs increase the child development in these countries. As a result, this study recommends that any improvement in ICTs lead higher-level gender equality in the societies. And simultaneous improvement in ICT and governance and institutional quality variables leads higher and beyond impact than their individual effects on gender equality, which creates higher-level child development and well equipped next generations. Keywords: gender equality, development, information and communication technology (ICT) ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………