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Digital Africa: An Analysis of Digital Trends in Africa and Their Driving Factors

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Space Fostering African Societies

Part of the book series: Southern Space Studies ((SOSPST))

Abstract

Today’s space domain has been increasingly intertwined with the information domain, which is why digitization is an important issue within the context of space programs. New satellite systems, which are becoming more important for digital data communication, provide an opportunity to improve the access to the Internet. The following chapter analyzes the main trends of digitization in Africa and their driving factors. In doing so, the relationships between Internet usage and economic and technological developments in Africa will be explored by using quantitative data from the Worldbank and the Economist. The analysis will conclude that there are positive trends in the area of digitization, which are strongly affected by the access to electricity and economic well-being. Other variables examined in this study will be urbanization, literacy and “good” political management, which turned out to be important prerequisites for internet usage.

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Notes

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  30. 30.

    The Worldbank dataset can be downloaded from https://data.worldbank.org/region/sub-saharan-africa?view=chart. The Inclusive Internet Index 2019 published by the Economist Intelligence Unit can be downloaded from https://theinclusiveInternet.eiu.com/.

  31. 31.

    Silver, Laura & Johnson, Courtney (2018) Internet Connectivity Seen as Having Positive Impact on Life in Sub-Saharan Africa, Pew Research Center, 9 October, S. 12.

  32. 32.

    Brew Hammond, Abeeku (2010) Energy access in Africa: Challenges ahead, in: Energy Policy, Vol. 38, pp. 2291–2301.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Defense Academy Vienna, Institute for Higher Military Leadership, Vienna, Austria

    Christopher Yoon

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Correspondence to Christopher Yoon .

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  1. SpaceLab, University of Cape Town, Rondebosch, South Africa

    Annette Froehlich

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Yoon, C. (2020). Digital Africa: An Analysis of Digital Trends in Africa and Their Driving Factors. In: Froehlich, A. (eds) Space Fostering African Societies. Southern Space Studies. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32930-3_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32930-3_9

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