2022/07/12 by Thelen, Michael
#FOS: Media and communications
paper · doi:10.25598/jkm/2022-14.40
The internet has become an omnipresent tool in a lot of aspects of people’s everyday lives. It has been theorised that the internet, through its heterarchical and open nature, has transformed the way information and knowledge is distributed. Ideally, using the internet could be a tool of democratisation to improve the conditions and life chances of the disadvantaged. A new way of learning on the internet via Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) has promised to bridge the educational divide among those excluded from the formal education system. In spite of this, not everybody reaps the same benefits; socio-economicand digital cleavages still stand within and between territories. To what extent does the internet foster democratisation, in the case of MOOCs? This paper provides a synthesis of the topic via a literature review.