The article examines four models of data governance emerging in the current platform society. While major attention is currently given to the dominant model of corporate platforms collecting and economically exploiting massive amounts of personal data, other actors, such as small businesses, public bodies and civic society, take also part in data governance. The article sheds light on four models emerging from the practices of these actors: data sharing pools, data cooperatives, public data trusts and personal data sovereignty. We propose a social science-informed conceptualisation of data governance. Drawing from the notion of data infrastructure we identify the models as a function of the stakeholders’ roles, their interrelationships, articulations of value, and governance principles. Addressing the politics of data, we considered the actors’ competitive struggles for governing data. This conceptualisation brings to the forefront the power relations and multifaceted economic and social interactions within data governance models emerging in an environment mainly dominated by corporate actors. These models highlight that civic society and public bodies are key actors for democratising data governance and redistributing value produced through data. Through the discussion of the models, their underpinning principles and limitations, the article wishes to inform future investigations of socio-technical imaginaries for the governance of data, particularly now that the policy debate around data governance is very active in Europe.
Purpose This conceptual contribution is based on the observation that digital inequalities literature has not sufficiently considered digital footprints as an important social differentiator. The purpose of the paper is to inspire current digital inequality frameworks to include this new dimension. Design/methodology/approach Literature on digital inequalities is combined with research on privacy, big data and algorithms. The focus on current findings from an interdisciplinary point of view allows for a synthesis of different perspectives and conceptual development of digital footprints as a new dimension of digital inequality. Findings Digital footprints originate from active content creation, passive participation and platform-generated data. The literature review shows how different social groups may experience systematic advantages or disadvantages based on their digital footprints. A special emphasis should be on those at the margins, for example, users of low socioeconomic background. Originality/value By combining largely independent research fields, the contribution opens new avenues for studying digital inequalities, including innovative methodologies to do so.
Given that the Internet is now ubiquitous in high-income nations, do Internet skills still matter? The authors of this chapter synthesize a body of research that shows how Internet skills, defined across ten dimensions, remain critical, especially as the technology becomes ever more significant and embedded into everyday life. Having the requisite skills to use the Internet and related social media is essential to avoid being excluded from key facets of society. This chapter demonstrates the need to build the study of skills into digital inequality scholarship that seeks to address concerns over online experiences tending to follow and reinforce socioeconomic inequalities. Complementing research by Quan-Haase, Zhang, Wellman, and Wang (Chapter 5, this volume), this chapter challenges stereotypes of young people being tech-savvy, showing that youth are not universally knowledgeable about digital tools and media.
2 STRUCTURED ABSTRACTPurpose: In recent times the relationship between social stratification and internet use has become more complex. In order to understand the new configuration of the digital divide, this chapter examines the relationship between socioeconomic background and digital engagements among youths. Methodology: This study explores digital inequalities among Italian teenagers from a holistic perspective. It draws on primary data obtained with a triangulation of methods: a survey on a representative sample of 2,025 high school students and 56 semi-structured interviews with teenagers from different social classes. Findings: The statistical models indicate that cultural capital and parents' occupational status do not associate with broader social media use but are positively related with online informationseeking. The interpretative analysis suggests that teenagers from the upper-middle class in licei make sense of the internet "vertically," in affiliation with parental socialization and are more concerned with capital enhancing activities. Instead, teenagers from less advantageous social contexts appropriate the internet "horizontally," jointly with peers, and are mostly interested in social-networking and UGC production. Practical implications: School track, along with parents' socio-economic status and cultural capital, influences teenagers' internet use. Further studies could explore whether school tracking contributes to digital inequalities. Originality: The study extends Annette Lareau's theory of parenting styles and social reproduction, but also obtains innovative results related to digital inequalities among youth. Contrary to expectations, teenagers from less advantageous social backgrounds enrolled invocational schools have better chances to actively participate in social media than teens from the upper-middle class in academic-oriented high schools.
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