This paper sets out to offer a first examination of this issue, based on articles published on the elearningeuropa.info portal.

A brief theoretical note may prove useful to focus the question. According to Information Theory, knowledge tends to become concentrated in itself. Richer structures are able to accumulate new information with ease. In contrast however, “info-poor” structures tend to remain so. In other words, the distance between those who know a lot and those who know little is tending to grow because the former gather information faster than the latter. The propensity of information to become accumulated into increasingly complex structures seems to be a general tendency of all systems, from human societies to ecosystems.

This context provides the setting for the two basic academic visions that the new technologies invoke in contemporary societies:

1. The new technologies may constitute another exclusion factor to be added to the classics (age, poverty, illiteracy and so on). ICTs may therefore aggravate pre-existing problems.

2. The new technologies may help overcome some “traditional” exclusion, fostering as they do new methods of learning, and can especially benefit social groups distanced from traditional education.

Both visions are clearly contrasting. Yet both are probably true. What factors determine the predomination of one force or the other in one particular social group or context?

Do the information and communication technologies constitute a new exclusion factor?

Some of the articles published on the elearningeuropa.info will help us explore to what extent the new technologies may represent an exclusion factor.

The article, Obstacles to Older People using Computers, by Melanie Lewin, offers an interesting perspective on the problems affecting the elderly. Senior citizens make up a perfect example of the exclusion phenomena as they concentrate a large number of exclusion factors: their advanced age is added to their poverty (the elderly generally exist on a low income); they suffer disabilities (the severity of physical problems increases with age); their educational level (usually lower than average); elements related to gender (there are many more elderly women than men), and so on.

To date, the new technologies have acted as a factor of exclusion rather than one of inclusion in this context. Senior citizens have little or no access to the information society and this intensifies their remaining at the margin of the social system. In Catalonia, for example, 71.7% of young people between the ages of 15 and 19 are Internet users, a percentage that falls to 4.7% for people aged from 60 to 64, according to the study The Net Society in Catalonia, published in 2002.

Though the passage of time will tend to improve these results it is obvious that in our ageing Western societies an extremely high proportion of people have no access to the ever-increasing number of services available through the Internet. Worse still is the fact that many senior citizens show no interest whatsoever in the virtual world, seeing the new technologies as “not for them”, and thus tend towards their own self-exclusion, according to the thesis of the French sociologist Philippe Breton (see the article, “Old People Feel Excluded from New Technologies”.

Much remains to be done to redress this situation and in this respect the "Report on Special Education in Europe" provides a useful focus. When educational needs are highly specific and complex, e-learning systems should be adapted to certain specific contexts and thus introduce the flexibility that pupils lack. They should, above all however, also form part of a global, coherent educational approach. There is little point offering a few classes to senior citizens, for example, if later they have nobody to answer the endless number of little doubts that the day-to-day handling of computers raises for a novice in the field. An education and training service should be provided which is especially adapted to extremely well-defined areas and characteristics.

According to the "Charter for Digital and Social Inclusion", the digital divide, “is a multidimensional phenomenon which includes barriers that are highly diverse in nature. It is the cause of great concern that some of these are in essence psychological and must therefore be approached with an educational strategy. Others, involving a lack of confidence or motivation, are attributable to the user, but there are also barriers in the production of e-learning systems, such as the development of excessively formal systems and non-adapted technologies, the lack of meaningful context and the use of generalist methodologies that fail to pay the necessary attention to cultural and social contexts.”

Are the new technologies an inclusion factor?

On the other hand, some reports have detected an interesting potential for inclusion in the new technologies. A study carried out in Spain, for example, suggests that pupils with least motivation and the worst grades are those who experience greatest improvement when the computer and digital teaching materials are introduced into their education (see the article, “An experimental study on the impact of the computer in the classroom”). According to this line of argument, the new technologies can play a “redistributor” role in the dissemination of information by stimulating the rhythm of information acquisition of those who know less and bringing it closer to that of those who know more. This is the case because the new technologies exert influence in two essential aspects: motivation and learning processes.

With regard to motivation, the analysis carried out by Wendy Jones in her article, "The BBC and e-learning" is highly revealing. The wide range of resources and platforms made available by the BBC (interactive television, mobile telephony, websites and so on) has enabled the Corporation to reach segments of the public usually highly resistant to formal learning proposals. As Jones explains, “The e-learning environment created by these new technologies can break down barriers to learning, particularly among the young. For many of this “screen generation”, new technology is inherently attractive and ICT is linked to leisure.” The migration to e-learning from computer games or interactive TV may prove to be relatively simple.

As regards learning processes, obviously the new technologies bring into play a certain degree of diversity in cognitive processes, reason for which it is easier for a multimedia system to be adapted to individual learning styles. This will attract a wider variety of pupils and may lead to more uniform access to knowledge. Furthermore, as Professor Tony Bates emphasises, “multimedia systems allow a richer mental construction than classical linear text.”

Some characteristics of the new technologies seem to facilitate their inclusive role. Many e-learning projects work in informal environments and introduce certain leisure-based aspects: participative models are often introduced which are based on games and simulations and the diversity of resources (texts, animation, videos and so on) stimulates diverse styles of learning. But to be able to play out their inclusive role it is necessary for access to the new technologies to be produced in the right environment, an environment which excluded collectives obviously lack.

Conclusion

In certain contexts it seems clear that the new technologies may help distribute knowledge better. Information will continue its tendency to accumulate in itself, but ICTs can help in the flow of information towards the less fortunate. It is also highly likely that they help homogenize learning rhythms.

For this to occur however, minimum conditions of access must be available from which the ICTs can help break down the barrier of lack of motivation and previous information. When the problem of exclusion is serious and the minimum conditions of access to computer systems inexistent, the new technologies only exacerbate the existing problem by adding a further element of exclusion.

How can we avoid the negative side of ICTs and strengthen their positive aspects? The answer to this question lies in guaranteeing equality in their conditions of access, an issue far more related to media literacy than to access to technology. We shall be witnesses in the coming years to a multitude of projects along these lines. In fact, there are now so many initiatives that the e-Learning for e-Inclusion project has developed its own method of classification: a Digital Library containing a great number of projects, classified by the type of inclusion problem and the solution they provide.

The number of projects whose aim is to achieve digital inclusion will rise exponentially over the next few years. The challenge will consist in learning enough from them to be able to design a structured framework of knowledge. Research into exclusion factors must be energetically promoted, as well as that into the characteristics of the different social groups that are excluded.