Abstract
Access to broadband Internet is becoming a necessity for obtaining information and resources about healthcare, education, and employment. However, the broadband global digital divide continues to inhibit and limit individuals' access within and among nations. We address the question, What factors hinder and enable people from being able to afford broadband access to obtain vital information? This paper uses social justice theory (Rawls [47] and Sen [52-55]) as applied to information ethics (Floridi [21, 22], Britz [4-6], van Dijk [58, 59]) to empirically examine the relationship between measures of social justice and individual capability on broadband affordability in 146 countries. The results from our statistical model show that measures of social justice and individual capability are positively associated with affordable broadband access across countries.