Soft barriers to ICT application in development: trust and information quality in Russia

✍ Scribed by Elia V. Chepaitis

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2002
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 84 KB
• Volume: 14
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0954-1748
• DOI: 10.1002/jid.871

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Research into the diffusion and use of ICTs often focuses on the adequacy of ‘hard’ factors in information infrastructures: technological elements which affect affordability and connectivity. This paper proposes that successful ICT application depends also upon ‘soft’ factors in domestic information infrastructures: legal, political, socio‐cultural, and economic characteristics that affect not only ICTs but also the quality of information resources handled by those ICTs. Based on research data from Russia, the paper argues that one soft factor—trust—is critical for information quality and, hence, for ICT‐based information systems success in transitional and developing economies. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.