Towards a National Strategy for Digital Inclusion
A discussion document adopted by Telecommunities Canada (TC)1
to support participation in public forums on the role of broadband in social change
Garth Graham
January 19, 2010

Addressing social and economic disadvantage in an Internet Economy
Canada is a long way from achieving universal broadband access, especially in rural and remote
areas. But the critical issue is not access to broadband technologies. Universal broadband
coverage is not the same as universal capacity to use those technologies for development.
Regardless of urban or rural, some people will remain marginalized even when everyone is
online. It’s not enough to give those who are excluded basic access to the technologies. It
requires different social skills as much as different technical skills to come in from the cold of
digital exclusion.
"Digital inclusion" means that we don't forget those who, for what ever reason, are unable to
“connect” effectively. It means that all citizens have the means, skills and tools to integrate the
internet comfortably into their lives. Only then will we see the advent of new products and
services, new and rewarding jobs, increased knowledge, enhanced and meaningful
communications and active participation in the institutions and processes of government, society
and even of family. Only then will we achieve the productivity gains needed to drive our
economy and society into the 21st century.
World development statistics show us that it matters how a country decides to use its money that social change comes before economic change. For example, the speed of development
moves much faster if you are healthy first than if you are wealthy first.2 The intention of a
national strategy for digital inclusion would be to ensure the well-being and economic
productivity of our communities by enhancing the capacity of their most disadvantaged members
to be included in daily life online.
Community services sector productivity
Public policy is not yet supporting the transition of our communities into the digital age. Canada
does not have a blueprint for how, in an Internet Economy, the uses of information and
communications technologies can be made to serve Canada's socio-economic development,
never mind how we can assist those who such an economy excludes. When such a plan emerges,
it will not be about technology. But it will encompass the uses of technology for community
development and the ways that collaborative tools promote the effectiveness of the community
services sector.
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Because we are already well into an Internet Economy, Canada’s community services sector now
has hundreds of thousands of people involved in the provision of digital inclusion programs. We
must not ignore their experience.
The shapers of Canadian public policy need to place more value on the productivity and
innovative capacity of the community services sector. Effective community-based agencies
know how to compete for, aggregate and leverage meager resources from many different sources
into significant social and economic outcomes. In the same way that they have always survived
by innovating, they are now successfully experimenting with new groups and new kinds of
groups. Their effectiveness is the critical component of community resilience and self-reliance
But how can a community collaboratively do this? How does community converge around
common cause from a citizen’s perspective? Much of the infrastructure of the community
services sector still remains organized into vertical silos. Thoughtful use of information and
communications technologies can and will support a horizontal integration and networking of
community services. A well-defined digital inclusion strategy will reinforce the ability of
communities to effectively plan and manage their local resources.
Telecentres
Internationally, “telecentres” is the word used for what Canadians have called “community
access.” A telecentre is a public place where people can access computers, the internet, and
other digital technologies that enable people to gather information, create, learn, and
communicate with others while they develop essential 21st-century digital skills. A telecentre
provides public access to a variety of online tools and resources in the context of
demographically and socio-economically dynamic communities, ever changing technologies, and
locally driven social and digital initiatives.
In effect, assisted by the Community Access Program (CAP),3 networks of telecentres have
become a critical part of the infrastructure of many communities and social service agencies
across Canada. Strengthening, deepening and intensifying on-going relationships amongst those
telecentre networks and their support partners through a vibrant, sustainable telecentre
community is critical to enhancing the social and economic impacts of telecentres on community
development and digital inclusion in Canada.
In the process of designing a National Digital Inclusion Strategy, we need to define and evolve a
National Network of Community-based Telecentres that:
1. Recognizes the potential of every Canadian to engage with the Internet economy more as
an active producer than as a passive consumer.
2. Is based on a national strategy developed through open dialogue with all telecentre
stakeholders.

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3. Strengthens and expands interactive telecentre networking in order to intensify knowledge
sharing about best practices.
4. Is governed by a group officially designated as a “collaborative learning community of
stakeholders,” so that shared best practices and learning govern the program direction.
5. Has adequate training capacity for operating it (i.e. a National Telecentres Network
Academy that trains telecentre managers4 by sharing the online learning capacities of
participating agencies).
6. Has a connection from it to broader Canadian national strategies for the uses of
information and communications technologies in socio-economic development.
7. Has a multi-stakeholder plan and financing for a transition to local control.
Beyond CAP: a future for digital inclusion
CAP was an infrastructure program (build it and get out). But an infrastructure model does not
address the dynamic reality of processes for community development online. CAP was expected
to sunset. But community experience in its delivery reveals an added functional responsibility in
social programs and community economic development. What CAP proves is that, in a society
that is online, people marginal to that society have their burden increased by the gap between
their needs for access to processes of digital inclusion and their capacity to use them.
We call for development of a National Strategy for Digital Inclusion that draws upon the
experience of the changing nature of social services delivery and community development that
Canadian communities already have. There is an opportunity for open discussion of a National
Strategy for Digital Inclusion that moves the focus towards telecentres and local governments.
It's about an approach to a public policy shaping process, not the design of telecentres. The roles
and functions for telecentres will vary as various local agencies apply them to what they see as
their local needs. Getting acceptance at all levels of government to a community-based approach
for the support of digital inclusion will involve:
1. A need for open forums for discussion of the existing program's "lessons learned" and its
future potential to increase the resilience and self-reliance of communities under an
evolved program.
2. New public policy that endorses the role of digital inclusion in Canada's national
strategies for the uses of information and communications technologies in socio-economic
development.
3. Support of a new federal-provincial "transitional" program, allowing for a staged
transfer of primary operational responsibility to the provinces along with an annual federal
funding in recognition of on-line delivery of federal services and programs. It's the

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provinces that have the most direct involvement with the community-based organizations
and institutions that act as delivery points for digital inclusion services as essential
infrastructure. It’s that local control that will make the program relevant to communitybased economic development.
Good public policy enables participation
Public policy does not change in a vacuum. It follows from changes in society. Governments
are not isolated from profound changes in social relationship and, therefore, how the nature of
citizenship alters in the face of daily life online.
Although still rare, participatory forums to address this issue are beginning to occur at the
community-level.5 There are communities that have advanced digital inclusion via the
negotiation of community benefits agreements during explorations of locally controlled
broadband initiatives. There are communities that have held intense dialogues over the best
routes to social change in a digital age. Their citizens are learning that it is hard work to
negotiate the transition from vertical institutions to horizontal networked relationships.
What’s missing from Canadian public policy is any understanding of the radical transformation
in the way we do things represented by the Internet’s existence. We strongly believe that the
best uses of the Internet are:
• To increase the capacity of local communities to meet their particular needs.
• To increase the capacity of collaborating individuals in those communities to decide the
context of the problems they face for themselves.
The drafters of a National Strategy for Digital Inclusion would seek to understand where and
how people gain the confidence to appropriate information and communications technologies for
their own use. And they would seek to understand the conditions under which that appropriation
gets channeled to collective and constructive purposes. What is needed to move towards these
goals?
1. An open and distributed process of dialogue (public forums, wikis, websites etc) about a
national strategy for digital inclusion.
2. A strategy document that summarizes the conclusions of that dialogue.
3. The means of carrying that strategy forward into the kinds of federal-provincial decisionmaking forums that are beginning to address a full national strategy for the uses of
information and communications technologies in Canada’s development.

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An acknowledgement
To the memory of Gaylen Duncan. He embraced the task of understanding and expressing
digital inclusion with his usual curiosity and enthusiasm in the face of any impossible dream. He
readily shared his vast experience of how to make sure that economic and political power is
applied to just ends. If only he were here, I would tell him that, “Yes, Gaylen, we will make it
happen.”

Endnotes
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Telecommunities Canada is a community of practice about the uses of online networks for community
development. We act to understand and shape the uses of ICTs in our communities. Community networking
practices play a significant role in facilitating face-to-face local social interaction. We can and do remind Canada’s
public policy debates that there are now many existing networked communities that are experienced in the effective
use of ICTs for community development. Together with like-minded groups, our goal is to connect theory, policy
and practice in ways that expand and improve the ability of communities to design their own future. TC has become
a significant repository of, and network for, the local experience gained through public participation in the
Community Access Program. Telecommunities Canada (TC) advocates for control of open broadband networks as a
local responsibility. http://www.tc.ca
2

Hans Rosling: Debunking third-world myths with the best stats you've ever seen. TED, posted June 2006.
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/92
3

“Thanks to the support of the Community Access Program (CAP) and its companion youth initiative program
(CAP-YI), community access centers have been the backbone of digital inclusion in Canada. Along with young
interns and a legion of volunteers, they provide job search and software training, technology literacy programs,
access to community services, and cultural integration opportunities. They work with local private and public sector
partners to provide services and share experience in many different areas - from basic computer skills to website
building. Along the way, thousands of CAP-YI trained youth gain experience that helps them move on in the
world.” The Importance of Digital Inclusion Programs for Canadians: a support letter for Public Internet
Access to Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Internet for Everyone.ca, December 2009.
http://www.internetforeveryone.ca/en/participer/lettre/
4

In organizational theory and practice related to communities of practice online, their role is now called “stewarding
technology for communities.” Etienne Wenger, Nancy White and John D. Smith. Digital habitats: stewarding
technology for communities. Portland, Oregon, CPSquare, August 2009.
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Examples of open forums on the best routes to socio-economic change in a digital age include:
•

The City that Networks: Transforming Society and Economy Through Digital Excellence. Report Of
The Mayor’s Advisory Council on closing the Digital Divide. Chicago, May 2007.
http://egov.cityofchicago.org:80/webportal/COCWebPortal/COC_EDITORIAL/DigitalDivide.pdf

•

Dalhousie Student Union, Chebucto Community Network (www.chebucto.ns.ca) and Dalhousie Computer
Science Society. Who is Shaping your Digital Future? a town hall panel discussion. Halifax. October
26, 2009. http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/townhall/

•

Digital Engagement: Technology for social benefit. A UK blog to address the use of social technology
for a social benefit. http://digitalengagement.org/

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•

Pathways to Technology, First Nations Technology Council (FNTC). ICT Capacity Development:
Building Strong Sustainable Communities. British Columbia, FNTC, February 2009.
http://www.fntc.info/files/Presentations/2009_ICT%20Capacity%20Plan%20FNTCICT%20Summit%20February%2020%202009.pdf

•

Telecommunities Canada (www.tc.ca) and SaveOurNet.ca (http://saveournet.ca/) have hosted Open
Internet Town Hall events in Vancouver, Ottawa and Toronto, 2009. See also:
http://www.internetforeveryone.ca/en/accueil/

•

Tony Vetter, Don MacLean, and Heather Creech. Projecting the Evolution of the Internet, its
Technologies, Communities and Management: Canadian stakeholders’ understandings and
perceptions of the issues. Report on a pilot workshop held in Vancouver, British Columbia, March
26–27, 2009. Winnipeg, International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD), June 2009.
http://www.iisd.org/pdf/2009/projecting_internet_evolution.pdf

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