A Scoping Review of Digital Inclusion and the Digital Divide in Rural Zimbabwean Communities: An African Perspective (2021–2026)

This scoping review maps the contemporary landscape of digital inclusion and the digital divide within rural Zimbabwean communities, analysing literature from 2021 to 2024. It addresses the critical question of how intersecting socio-economic, infrastructural, and gendered barriers perpetuate digital exclusion in these settings. Adhering to the methodological framework of Arksey and O’Malley, the review employed a documented search protocol across key academic databases and grey literature sources, with clear inclusion and exclusion criteria. Data were systematically charted and analysed thematically.

The findings indicate that the digital divide in rural Zimbabwe is profoundly multidimensional, extending beyond physical access to encompass critical issues of affordability, digital literacy, and the local relevance of online content. A central theme is the acute gendered dimension of exclusion, where patriarchal norms, disproportionate care burdens, and lower financial autonomy severely constrain women’s and girls’ use of digital technologies. The review concludes that effective digital inclusion requires context-specific, community-centred interventions. These must integrate infrastructural development with substantive digital skills training and support for locally meaningful content creation. By centring Zimbabwean rural experiences, this work challenges universalist assumptions and underscores digital access as a fundamental enabler of socio-economic rights and gender equality in the African digital era.