[Sixth in a series] – 1 2 3 4 5 6

We know that the UN has created an ICT Task Force and laid out an ambitious 8-part Millennium Development Goals proclamation. We know the history of development (in broad brush strokes) and how the current trends involve the use of ICTs in development programs. What do these programs look like when ICTs are deployed without forethought? How does one distinguish between good and bad ICT deployments? In answer to these questions, let us take a look at some case studies that will serve as cautionary tales and as exemplars.

South Africa has established Learning Centres “intended to empower indigenous peoples by helping them take advantage of the multiple potentials and capacities of ICTs” (Ess, 1). A review of the Learning Centres however shows a steady stream of failure. Why? “[I]n part, because of basic cultural conflicts. Briefly, the Centres reflect their designer’s Western emphasis on individual and silent learning – in contrast with indigenous preferences for learning in collaborative and often noisy, performative ways” (Ess, 1).  Since the technologies and social contexts of the Learning Centres favored the communication style and cultural values of the designers, “these values and preferences clash with those of the indigenous peoples the Centres are intended to serve, with almost total failure as a result” (Ess, 1).

Moving from the particular to the general, consider how the following example of conserving indigenous knowledge is doomed from the outset. According to many theorists, “the prime strategy for conserving indigenous knowledge is ex situ conservation, i.e., isolation, documentation and storage in international, regional and national archives” (Agrawal, 4). This is the least expensive and technically easiest approach. And yet, a basic understanding of the nature of indigenous knowledge should guide us to realize that the attempt to “essentialize, isolate, archive and transfer such knowledge” ex situ is an inappropriate conservation strategy.

Both of these examples show the culture blindness that can occur due both to the Western mindset embedded within the implementation of the technology and the lack of consideration practiced in the development process.  The following examples show the successful attainment of the transmodern ‘third space’ or postcolonial moment.

In the event that the tacit nature of an indigenous practice doesn’t lend itself to recording and storage within a digital archive or database, “information about locations, individuals or organizations that can demonstrate or teach a practice could be used as a pointer to the source of IK” (Sen 377). Instead of forcing the round peg of intuitive practice into the square hole of an ill-suited archival practice, only the metadata is stored for searching, retrieval, and transmission. “What is exchanged is not the knowledge itself but meta-information: Who has the relevant knowledge and how to contact them” (Ranganathan, 7). The actual knowledge transfer would happen in the traditional way, person-to-person, without the interference of development methodologies inconsistent with cultural ways of knowing and doing.

Ess provides another example of successful development practice that shows how the Malaysian government went about introducing Internet access to the Kelabit, a highland people on the island of Borneo:

“A research team – including an anthropologist originally from the Kelabit community – first developed a base-line socio-economic profile of the community in order to establish the context and content of Internet use most suited to the extant community culture and communication preferences (Harris et al, 2001).  This profile – and the subsequent success of the project – demonstrate the importance of structuring ICT content and use to meet the more collaborative and oral orientations of the community” (2).

Conclusion

So, the critics are right: misguided ICT4D implementation that doesn’t take into consideration a wide range of cultural factors and explicitly or implicitly imposes Western processes or structures upon indigenous recipients does constitute a new form of computer-mediated colonialism. And yes, the proponents of ICT4D are right: ICTs, when implemented thoughtfully and respectfully – keeping the needs of the recipients at the fore – can be powerful agents of change in the fight to reduce poverty and improve the lives of marginalized peoples in developing nations. Our friend Hodja – who represents the interstitial spaces where effective practices can be synthesized or co-created? He is right, too.

Works Cited

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