Does the mobile phone affect social development? Evidence from Indonesian villages
Jahen Rezki
Telecommunications Policy, 2023, vol. 47, issue 3
Abstract:
This paper analyses the impact of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) on social development in Indonesian Villages. In this study, I use data from different waves of the Indonesian Village Potential Statistics (Potensi Desa) to determine whether mobile phone signal strength affects social development indicators. The results indicate that villages with a strong signal are statistically more likely to possess the proper infrastructure programs. Furthermore, mobile phones increase the availability of village libraries and access to credit for small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Using the plausibly exogenous variation of lightning strike intensity as the instrumental variable, this study suggests that higher mobile phone signal strength is positively associated with the policies implemented by the village head and leads to better social development. As the mechanisms, this study shows that mobile phones increase the likelihood of having collective action and civic engagement, increasing villagers’ political participation and use of telecommunication services, thus leading to an increase in village government’s accountability.
Keywords: Mobile phone; ICT; Village government; Indonesia; Accountability; Policy-making (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D73 D78 H4 H7 L96 O1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)
Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0308596123000149
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:telpol:v:47:y:2023:i:3:s0308596123000149
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/30471/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... /30471/bibliographic
DOI: 10.1016/j.telpol.2023.102503
Access Statistics for this article
Telecommunications Policy is currently edited by Erik Bohlin
More articles in Telecommunications Policy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().