Digital access, skills, and dollars: applying a framework to digital exclusion in cultural institutions

COVID-19 and the associated “digital pivot” has drawn the impact of digital exclusion on cultural institutions into stark relief. Larger, well-funded institutions that had invested in digital access and skills prior to 2020 had a vital resource for engaging and maintaining audiences. Those that had not – most often smaller, regional institutions – were left behind. While a proliferating body of research has documented the sector’s experience of digital exclusion during the pandemic, these findings have yet to be situated within existing digital inclusion literature. Drawing on qualitative data from 73 cultural institutions, I demonstrate that although typically applied to individuals, a digital inclusion framework of access, skills, and dollars offers an approach for identifying and understanding digital exclusion within cultural institutions. In doing so, I provide a mechanism around which interventions can be structured, and a digitally included cultural sector worked towards.