E-society Realities In Sub-saharan Africa

Over the last decade,Sub-Saharan Africa has undergone cultural transformations resulting from the development of ICTs at the political,economic and social levels.The e-Society,beyond the organizational perspectives or the form that can be attributed to it,uses ICT and particularly Internet.The spectrum of technology,digital transformation and changes created by the 4th industrial revolution dominate through debates,researches,companies and institutions.Through this study,we have examined more closely the formation of the e-Society in Sub-Saharan Africa,especially its realities by analysing some scientific publications and qualitative data to see the evolutions or the trajectory travelled to lift the veil on the phenomenon.In the pursuit of our investigations,we have collected primary data to perform a quantitative study as well.Sub-Saharan Africa remains an area where most illiterates and poor people are concentrated.Despite this fact,these populations have not remained on the side lines of globalization,that is what led us to take a deep look at the behaviour of these populations vis-a-vis the e-Society.Based on an investigation of 48 African countries,we were able to collect opinions from 607 participants through an online survey.The study reveals that Africa has embraced e-Society,just as the world does,but its context offers a particular reality.In addition to the qualitative approach,the study relied on statistical techniques such as principal component analysis,confirmatory factor analysis and Structural Equation Modelling(SEM)to process and analyse the data collected through the Statistical Package for the Social Sciences,SPSS 25 and AMOS 23 to highlight the realities of the electronic society by confirming or refuting our assumptions.The results revealed two modes under which the e-Society operates in sub-Saharan Africa,namely:a government-type organization(e-Government,e-Commerce,e-Education,e-Health,e-Agriculture,etc.)and that of private type(communities or private platforms,working groups and academic exchanges,social networks,etc.).The main conclusion that can be drawn from this research is that Sub-Saharan Africa is experiencing the e-Society.Sub-Saharan African countries use and strongly benefit from the innovation spread due to ICTs proliferation around the world in recent years.This phenomenon has boosted digital transformation,but Sub-Saharan Africa is still far away because of significant barriers.Overall,this study allows to understand why and how Sub-Saharan Africa has reconfigured itself in relation to the electronic society.Exploring e-Society realities would surely assist rethinking how these societies are organized,enhance the understanding about the spread of e-Society,provide information on those e-markets with strong investment opportunities and gain business opportunities,boost social innovation and information in real time.E-Society realities provides an idea of the huge and untapped potential of Africa Sub-Saharan countries desperately waiting to be used properly for Africa to take a stand and welcome the multiples Challenges of the 4th industrial revolution.