Digital Society, Governance & Development

About this journal

1.0 Aims and Scope

Digital Society, Governance & Development (DSGD) publishes interdisciplinary scholarship examining how digital technologies reshape institutions, economies, communities, public services and everyday social life.

The journal is concerned not only with technological adoption but with the social, political, institutional and developmental consequences of digital transformation. It welcomes research addressing the ways digital systems redistribute opportunity, authority, information, risk and power.

Core areas include digital government, AI governance, data governance, digital public infrastructure, platform economies, digital labour, civic technology, digital media, education technology, smart cities, digital financial systems, technology and development, surveillance, digital inclusion and digital inequality.

DSGD provides a forum for scholarship from social science, public policy, development studies, information systems, media studies, sociology, political science, communication, economics and related fields where the central research problem concerns digital society or governance.

The journal encourages work from diverse geographical and institutional contexts and particularly values scholarship that moves beyond assumptions that technological change produces identical effects across societies.

1.1 Core Research Areas

Relevant themes include digital transformation of institutions; digital government; public-sector technology; digital identity; digital public infrastructure; platform governance; algorithmic governance; AI regulation; data protection and governance; digital labour; platform work; digital financial inclusion; technology-mediated participation; online communities; social media governance; misinformation and information integrity; surveillance; cybersecurity governance; digital education; digital health governance; smart cities; and inequalities in access, capability and outcomes.

1.2 Interdisciplinary and Emerging Areas

DSGD encourages research connecting technical systems with social institutions. Emerging areas include generative AI and society, public-sector algorithmic decision-making, platform accountability, automated welfare administration, digital sovereignty, cross-border data governance, digital identity infrastructures and governance of AI in low- and middle-income contexts.

2.0 Contributions We Welcome

The journal welcomes Original Research, Reviews, Systematic Reviews, qualitative and quantitative studies, mixed-methods research, comparative studies, policy and practice articles, Perspectives, Case Studies and Editorials.

Empirical research should provide sufficient information about context, sampling, data sources and analytical methods. The journal welcomes surveys, interviews, focus groups, ethnography, administrative-data analysis, computational social science, digital-trace analysis, content analysis, network analysis and appropriately designed mixed methods.

2.1 Evidence and Methodological Expectations

Authors should explain the social and institutional context in which digital phenomena are observed. Sampling decisions and limitations should be transparent.

Studies using online-platform or social-media data should explain how data were collected and consider privacy, consent, platform terms, representativeness and potential harm.

3.0 Disciplinary Standards

Research involving people must address appropriate ethical review, consent and confidentiality requirements.

Demographic categories should be reported carefully and only when analytically justified. Qualitative researchers should describe their analytical process sufficiently to support confidence in interpretation.

Authors should avoid treating technology as independent of institutional and social conditions.

3.1 Research Transparency

Where data cannot be publicly shared because of privacy, platform restrictions, participant protection or legal obligations, authors should explain the restriction.

Researchers should reflect on positionality where the relationship between researcher, participants and context materially affects interpretation.

4.0 Topics Outside Scope

DSGD does not normally consider purely technical computer-science manuscripts without substantive societal or governance analysis; unsupported predictions about societal transformation; purely promotional descriptions of digital platforms; partisan commentary without scholarly analysis; or claims generalised across populations without evidence appropriate to those populations.