Introduction: Digitalisation and Development: Issues for India and Beyond

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) provide new opportunities and new challenges for developing economies. ICT adoption, digitalization and automation provide formidable new opportunities in terms of increased efficiency and productivity, the creation of new services and occupations and increased connectivity among agents. However, the extent to which developing economies are able to reap these potential benefits is contingent on a set of other social, economic and institutional dimensions. While economic growth and rising productivity are the major expected outcomes of digitalization, digital divides and related forms of exclusion and inequalities are commonly observed too. India, one of the largest economies in the world, with a remarkable pace of ICT diffusion, represents a relevant case to investigate the impacts of digitalization on economic development. The present book collects a series of novel contributions on this theme, studying the Indian experience in an international cross-country perspective. This introductory chapter presents background information on the Indian case, introduces the main themes on the relationships between ICTs, socio-economic development and digital divides and provides a summary and road map to the chapters included in the book. On the whole, the main message of this book is that the impact of ICTs is contingent upon other assets, capabilities and institutional conditions. National policies should therefore not only promote digitalization as such but also ensure its co-evolution and complementarity with a variety of other country-specific factors