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<p><img width="90%" src="//d24jp206mxeyfm.cloudfront.net/assets/courseware/v1/8e4c75055b681c94ee8b4e3fc14834d0/asset-v1:OSCE+HD-RPD-EN+2021_09+type@asset+block/undraw_Documents_re_isxv.png" alt="Welcome" /></p>
<p>In this module, you will become familiar with and work towards the following learning objectives:</p>
<p>It is important to understand various aspects of digital accessibility for persons with disabilities and to be aware of the legal basis for accessible information and communication technology Including the legal basis set out in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities treaty, that has been ratified by nearly all OSCE participating States.</p>
<p>In this module, you will become familiar with and work towards the following learning objectives:</p>
<ul>
<li>To understand the importance of digital accessibility for persons with disabilities and for advancing inclusive e-governance;</li>
<li>Identify the legal basis for accessible ICT, including in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities;</li>
<li>Understand the role that accessible ICT plays in achieving citizen engagement and access to government.</li>
</ul>
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<h3>What are the implications of inaccessible ICT for persons with disabilities in the context of governance?</h3>
<p>To begin with, let's consider the implications of inaccessible ICT for persons with disabilities in the context of governance. Many of these affect the exercise of rights to participate in their communities, in political and public life and in accessing crucial services.</p>
<p>Achieving digital accessibility means that Information and Communication Technology (ICT) should not only be available and affordable, but also accessible. In other words, ICT must be designed to meet the needs of as many people as possible, including persons with disabilities.</p>
<p>Here are several areas poses tremendous problems for individuals with disabilities where accessibility is not taken into account:</p>
<ul>
<li>Not being able to obtain legal proof of identity, schedule medical appointments online</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Not being able to cast a vote in elections, understanding that increasingly election machinery is in digital format and may not be accessible.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Not being able to participate in online distance learning which means falling behind and learning something that we learned was a huge problem in the context of the Coven 19 pandemic, where so much learning transformed to be learning online and often in not in accessible ways, not being able to participate in or benefit from government funded social programmes and services.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Not being able to apply for social benefits and being further at risk for poverty in that case.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Not being able to register a company online or not being able to apply online for vocational rehabilitation or other government preferred promoted employment programmes.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Being able to apply for jobs with the government itself or not being able to apply for procurement and tender bids.</li>
</ul>
<p>All of these are important dimensions as we see the transition happening to E governance.</p>
<p>Accessibility of ICT is crucial for fulfilling the human rights of persons with disabilities given that ICTs have become the primary medium for communications, information, transactions, education and entertainment worldwide. Its implementation by legislators and policy makers in all countries is essential to ensure that the right of all people to communicate in the digital world is respected and protected.</p>
<p></p>
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<h3 class="hd hd-2">International Telecommunications Union: ICT/Digital Accessibility: The key to achieving a digitally inclusive world</h3>
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<h3>Good governance and the OSCE</h3>
<p>The OSCE works to tackle many aspects of weak governance, including corruption and money-laundering, promoting full respect of the rule of law, increase transparency, and develop effective legislation as the foundation of a functioning State. All of these dimensions of governance should be undertaken in alignment with disability rights standards and principles. For example, work on anti-corruption should ensure that schemes targeting persons with disabilities and that can divert resources away from persons who may be at high risk of exploitation – such as older persons with disabilities or persons with intellectual disabilities – are addressed and prosecuted.</p>
<h5>Some basics on ICT access for persons with disabilities</h5>
<p>The point of departure for implementation of ICT-accessibility measures is ICT usability, roughly defined as “the extent to which a product or service can be used by a person with a disability as effectively as it can be used by a person without that disability.” Users of ICTs must be able to:</p>
<ul>
<li>perceive,</li>
<li>understand, and</li>
<li>operate ICT products, content, and services.</li>
</ul>
<p>These three elements of usability are important in making assessments of ICT accessibility in exercising political rights, for instance, the way voting equipment is designed, its use, and where it is located or placed for the user.</p>
<p>ICT products, content, and services may be regarded as accessible if they can be used by all individuals equally, irrespective of disability. Like reasonable accommodations generally, ensuring full access can be (and frequently is) straightforward. It may include measures such as providing textual descriptions for images on election commission and other government websites (to aid blind persons using screen readers or persons experiencing comprehension barriers) or pictorial guides to portray step-by-step election procedures, or text/video-messaging services for emergency services for Deaf persons or for persons who cannot read the language.</p>
<p>A range of ICTs exists to carry out communication in ways that facilitate participation in the life of one’s community. These include television and radio, fixed and mobile telephony, text messaging and short message service (SMS), and Internet-based resources and services such as e-mail communication, websites, video, instant messaging over the Internet, interactive training tools, Voice over Internet Protocol services, web conferencing, social media that allow for instant communications, instant photo/video capture and sharing, and satellite communications. Perhaps the most beneficial aspect of ICT use to facilitate citizen participation and voice is the ability to create and deliver content in multiple formats through multiple media.</p>
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<p>Accessible information and communication technology (ICT) can level the playing field for persons with disabilities across life domains. This includes in education, employment, e-governance and civic participation, financial inclusion, and disaster management.</p>
<p>ICT enables the use of multiple means of communication—voice, text, and gestures— and it also helps break print-based and physical access barriers.</p>
<p>Accessible functionality such as voice recognition and magnification in mainstream devices, a large market of and for innovative mobile applications, and web-enabled accessibility services are driving down costs related to specialized assistive technology. Coupled with increasing public and private service provision through ICT, digital development can be a major catalyst for the full participation of persons with disabilities in society.</p>
<p><img height="939" width="879" src="//d24jp206mxeyfm.cloudfront.net/assets/courseware/v1/05a4c24efd6d8d26d36d7fae0108fdbc/asset-v1:OSCE+HD-RPD-EN+2021_09+type@asset+block/undraw_access_denied_6w73.png" alt="" /></p>
<p>International law and policy commitments underscore the importance of disability-inclusive ICT for persons with disabilities.</p>
<ul>
<li>The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development states that ICT access can accelerate development and bridge digital divides.</li>
<li>The New Urban Agenda (UN 2016) includes a commitment for facilitating access for persons with disabilities to ICT tools and systems.</li>
<li>The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) identifies ICT and accessible technology as important enablers of access to systems and services (Article 9). Several of the CRPD’s specific substantive rights either explicitly or implicitly make reference to accessible ICTs, including provisions on political participation (Article 29), access to information and freedom of expression (Article 21), and access to education (Article 24). Equally, accessibility of ICTs applies in respect to CRPD implementation measures.</li>
</ul>
<p>ICT accessibility falls within the ambit of nondiscrimination in several respects. First, the duty to provide reasonable accommodation may be achieved through ICT access measures, such as activating an accessibility feature of an e-voting machine to accommodate a voter with a disability. Second, positive measures provided to ensure equality, such as ICT access measures in developing a government website, are expected in order to facilitate equality. Third, the failure to provide reasonable accommodation where required in an individual case and where it would not represent an undue or disproportionate burden (e.g., placing electronic machinery such as a government service kiosk high, out of the reach of a wheelchair user) constitutes discrimination.</p>
<p>Further shoring up protections for persons with disabilities in ICT, the Marrakesh Treaty to Facilitate Access to Published Works for Persons Who Are Blind, Visually Impaired or Otherwise Print Disabled, adopted in 2013, responds to the barriers experienced by persons with print disabilities. the adoption of the Marrakesh Treaty that establishes some limitations and exceptions to traditional copyright law to enable the production and international transfer of published material in accessible formats, such as e-books, an important development given that less than 10% of all published materials are accessible to blind persons or persons with low vision.</p>
<p></p>
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<h3>Disability-inclusive ICT in policy and practice</h3>
<p>The World Development Report 2016: Digital Dividends points out that the realization of the potential of ICT for inclusive development will require active efforts across the ICT ecosystem as digital dividends are not spreading rapidly, nor evenly, given that nearly half of the world’s people are still offline and cannot fully participate in the digital economy. </p>
<p>A core component of digital inclusion for involves increasing access to digital infrastructure and broadband for persons with disabilities, addressing affordability, and expanding digital skills & literacy for persons with disabilities, essential for participation in the digital economy).</p>
<p>Support for inclusive digital development therefore requires a holistic and comprehensive ecosystem approach across five foundation elements:</p>
<ol>
<li>digital infrastructure,</li>
<li>digital platforms,</li>
<li>digital financial services,</li>
<li>digital business, and</li>
<li>digital skills.</li>
</ol>
<p>Addressing the digital divide affected people with disabilities requires to identify and tackle the gaps in the different entry points of the digital ecosystem, with the aim to make the internet reliable, affordable, safe, relevant, and accessible for all.</p>
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<h3>The role of the OSCE in digitalization</h3>
<p>The OSCE supports participating States in responding to the challenges and opportunities of digital transformation, thereby enhancing security and stability in the region, and promoting international co-operation on economic issues. This is achieved by working closely with all stakeholders, from the public and private sectors to academia, civil society and international organizations, supported also by our extensive field presences. Organizations of persons with disabilities are a critical resource in these efforts and are essential in ensuring that developments support accessibility to the digital world.</p>
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<p>Practices that focus on disability-inclusive ICTs are beginning to emerge.</p>
<p>ICTs play a critical role in advancing citizen participation in the electoral cycle and other realms of democratic engagement. ICT products, contents, and services are already used around the world to facilitate political participation and will continue to do so. Many election commissions and many countries have made important advances in this area of ICT accessibility. Most ICT applications in the political-engagement realm (whether in e-voting, accessing e-government, or engaging in online political action) can be made readily accessible to most users.</p>
<p>In order to do so, however, ICTs must make provision for alternative modes of interaction, provide outputs in multiple formats, support customization of configurations and settings, and be made compatible with assistive technology. ICT accessibility is clearly essential as election events become increasingly reliant on ICT for many aspects of implementation.</p>
<p>The World Bank project, Log In Georgia Project (P169698, FY21), is aiming to bring broadband internet infrastructure in 1,000 rural settlements of Georgia and connect more than half a million residents by 2025. The Project will support targeted interventions to boost digital inclusion for vulnerable groups including training programs to address digital exclusion, a pilot program to provide accessible technologies to facilitate digital accommodations, to monitor Project activities with a focus on analyzing their impact on vulnerable groups.</p>
<p>Persons with disabilities are identified as a key group at risk of digital exclusion, and some ideas for inclusion are:</p>
<ol>
<li>Design and implementation of mobilization and digital literacy programs for persons from identified groups that are at risk of being digitally excluded (initial focus will be on persons with disabilities, and on women‐headed households and ethnic minorities);</li>
<li>Design and implementation of a pilot program to provide accessible technologies to facilitate digital accommodation for persons with disabilities in selected rural settlements; and</li>
<li>Monitoring of the impact of all E-governance activities—including through beneficiary dialogues—to track impact on digital inclusion of women, households headed by women, social minorities, and persons with disabilities.</li>
</ol>
<p>The OECD Digital Government Toolkit, financed by the Digital Development Partnership, includes survey questions assessing the capabilities and maturity of governments in envisioning digital strategies to transform public service delivery for people with disabilities. Designing digital government services with assistive technologies helps ensure access and inclusion for all users.</p>
<p>Adoption of accessibility standards such as Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (US) and EN 301 549 (EU) are important to drive the design and delivery of accessible ICT. Increasingly, countries are including accessibility requirements in public procurement processes. Industry stakeholders have identified this as a driver for innovation and competition with a spillover effect for the larger consumer market (G3ict 2015).</p>
<p>The World Bank and International Telecommunication Union in 2020 published the Digital Regulation Handbook and Platform 2020. This resource underscores that accessibility for persons with disabilities has to be a consideration in the development of regulations, strategies for funds allocation, and consumer applications to achieve universal broadband access and use.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2020/09/08/the-world-bank-and-international-telecommunication-union-launch-handbook-on-digital-regulation">https://www.worldbank.org/en/news/feature/2020/09/08/the-world-bank-and-international-telecommunication-union-launch-handbook-on-digital-regulation</a></p>
<p>The United States Access Board has issued accessibility requirements for information and communication technology (508 Standards), including computer hardware and software, websites, and multimedia such as video, phone systems, and copiers.</p>
<p>Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, developed by Essential Accessibility, provide a step-by-step set of technical requirements explaining how to make websites accessible to all persons with disabilities. Using text messaging for emergency communications is an emerging best practice. In the United States, the Federal Communications Commission has mandated the deployment of Text-to-911 services to enable two-way text-based communications with Public Safety Answering Points, greatly benefiting persons with hearing, speech, and other communication impairments.</p>
<p>Standard setting to improve accessibility to the virtual environment and to information and communication technology is gaining momentum.</p>
<p>In the European Union, a number of EU rules now address accessibility including, for example, the Web Accessibility Directive, the Electric Communications Code, the Audiovisual Media Services Directive and copyright legislation. European accessibility standards are also in place to support accessible ICT and for organizations to adopt a Design for All approach. This work is reinforced by European policies advancing a digital transformation and digital public services that are inclusive of and accessible to persons with disabilities (European Commission, 2021).</p>
<p>International Telecommunication Union and G3ict (Global Initiative for Inclusive ICTs). n.d. “e-Accessibility Policy Toolkit for Persons with Disabilities.” <a href="http://www.e-accessibilitytoolkit.org/">http://www.e-accessibilitytoolkit.org/</a></p>
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<h3>COVID-19 challenges</h3>
<p>The recent shift to home-based working and the increased use of streaming for online working, as a side-effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, may provide increased opportunity for persons with some kinds of disability. </p>
<p>As an example, there is increased demand for simultaneous interpretation in online streamed meetings, in which partially-sighted people often excel. Furthermore, the increased acceptance of home-based work may benefit those with mobility constraints for whom working from home can be an enabler.</p>
<p>A strategy that is evident in some COVID- affected countries included the provision of grants to support digital devices and software, for instance, text to speech conversion software to help people with a hearing disability, or screen magnification software for partially-sighted persons during COVID.</p>
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<p>Well done, you have completed this module.</p>
<p>You should be now familiar with and work towards the following learning objectives:</p>
<ul>
<li>To understand the importance of digital accessibility for persons with disabilities and for advancing inclusive e-governance;</li>
<li>Identify the legal basis for accessible ICT, including in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities;</li>
<li>Understand the role that accessible ICT plays in achieving citizen engagement and access to government.</li>
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<p><em>Let's check what you have learned so far.</em></p>
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