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Central America is a stunning example of the uneven benefits of globalization. In communities with Riecken libraries, more than 40 percent of the library patrons come from households with monthly incomes below $100; more than a quarter live in homes with dirt floors. About half the library users have fewer than six books in their own homes, and less than 1 percent own home computers. Riecken libraries offset those shortfalls to accessible information. They also disproportionately benefit the most vulnerable populations in developing countries: children, women, indigenous people and rural populations. Riecken libraries are proving to be keystones for dramatic social advances in Central America, a region marked by the special problems of states that have emerged from conflict and where democracy, while anchored, is still fragile. |
