Home // ICDS 2020, The Fourteenth International Conference on Digital Society // View article

Addressing the Urban-Town-Rural Divide: The Digital Town Readiness Assessment Framework

Authors:
Theo Lynn
Pierangelo Rosati
Grace Fox
Colm O'Gorman
Edel Conway
Declan Curran

Keywords: Rural Development; Digital Town; Smart Cities; Smart Towns; Government Policy; Framework.

Abstract:
Economic growth, job creation, better public services, and improved quality of life are just some of the benefits from the digital transformation of society. Policymakers worldwide are not only investing in the infrastructure to deliver this digital future but measurement and benchmarking to assess digital progress. These benchmarks are, for the most part, national benchmarks heavily influenced by broadband connectivity and an increasing focus on cities and metropolises. Against the backdrop of global urbanisation, towns outside the functional urban area of cities are in danger of both being depopulated and disconnected. This paper proposes a definition for a digital town and outlines eight rationales for digital towns. Based on these rationales and a review of existing benchmarking frameworks for digitisation, we present a framework for measuring digital readiness at a town level. The framework can be used by local stakeholders and regional and national policymakers to understand digital town readiness and digital competitiveness; compare a town against selected national and international benchmarks; and stimulate stakeholder engagement on digital strategies for town development.

Pages: 84 to 93

Copyright: Copyright (c) IARIA, 2020

Publication date: March 22, 2020

Published in: conference

ISSN: 2308-3956

ISBN: 978-1-61208-760-3

Location: Valencia, Spain

Dates: from November 21, 2020 to November 25, 2020