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Indigenous knowledge and information technology for sustainable development

Randsome Bawack, Sian Roderick, Abdalla Badhrus, Denis Dennehy, Jacqueline Corbett

Information Technology for Development (2025), 18 pp.

"Despite the proliferation of IT applications worldwide, Indigenous knowledge remains marginalized in the mainstream information technology (IT) and Information Systems (IS) discourse. This special section explores tensions and opportunities at the intersection of Indigenous knowledge and digital te ... more

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Impact Assessment: Rural Household Devices Project Program of the Uganda Communications Universal Service Access Fund (UCUSAF)

Evelyn Namara, Ingrid Brudvig

Alexandria, VA; Kampala: Global Digital Inclusion Partnership; Uganda Communications Commission (2024), 46 pp.

"The impact assessment underscores the commendable achievements of the Rural Household Devices project. By December 2023, the initiative had successfully reached 54 districts and impacted 10,706 households. The outcomes are multifaceted and transformative, with a substantial number of beneficiaries ... more

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Media Loves Tech: Impact Stories

Asma Habidi, Benoit Faedo, Leah Winnett, Louisa Wright

Bonn: Deutsche Welle DW Akademie (2023), 24 pp.

"MEDIA LOVES TECH is the name and the idea behind this project that got underway in 2018. The goal is to bring together two worlds that are often too far apart: journalism and the startup community. Together with Al Khatt, a local project partner and non-governmental media organization, we wanted to ... scout, promote, develop and test innovations for the media sector. That same year, a legal support framework for startups in Tunisia came into effect, structured around a label of merit and benefits for entrepreneurs, investors and startups. Just like MEDIA LOVES TECH, it aims to support development through bold entrepreneurial spirit and innovative ideas. Since its launch, the annual MEDIA LOVES TECH incubation program, financed by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), supports eight to twelve startups. Implemented almost entirely online, and originally as a three-day mentor-supported hackathon, it has grown to become an incubation cycle that lasts three months. It promotes all phases of a startup — from the original idea to market entry. It has been five years since the program was started and it is still going strong. This publication is an initial assessment. Does the belief that progress comes from promoting innovation hold true? Can promoting new media projects with viable business models succeed in an unstable economic or political environment? One needs to look at various aspects to find answers. It is often said that over 90 percent of startups go under in the first two years. Still, startups are often seen as a forerunner to economic development and as having a stimulating effect on the overall economy. Even if initiatives do flop, their traces can still be found in the ecosystem. When assessing the MEDIA LOVES TECH program, it is worth reflecting on what has been achieved and gaining insights for the future. Five projects are presented here. Our team has taken an in-depth look at the projects’ stories and progress and includes key performance indicators. Measuring impact in an unsteady startup environment can be a challenge, and our success stories address this. But as we at DW Akademie believe, “big changes start small,” and so do the startups presented here." (Foreword) more

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Digital Development: Stories of Hope from Health and Social Development

Sundeep Sahay, Arunima Mukhrajee, Geoffrey Walsham, Thomas Hylland Eriksen (eds.)

Rugby: Practical Action Publishing (2022), xii, 164 pp.

"This book explores case studies across India, Kenya, Guatemala, Sri Lanka, and global, comparative settings, and asks what positive impact ICT applications (Health Information Systems, Pandemic response systems, Early Warning and Response Systems, Hospital Information System and Smartphone based Ap ... more

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Communicate and Collaborate to Prepare for the Unexpected: The International Institute for Communication and Development in the Netherlands

Caroline Figueres

Knowledge Management for Development Journal, volume 16, issue 1 (2021), pp. 105-112

"20 years after its foundation in 1996, IICD, the International Institute for Communication and Development, definitively closed. Over the years, IICD proved that Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can accelerate socio-economic development and that a methodology based on principles such ... more

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Don’t Build It: A Guide for Practitioners in Civic Tech - Tech for Development

Luke Jordan

Grassroot; MIT Governance Lab (2021), 38 pp.

"This guide is for teams or managers involved in considering or building “civic technology”, i.e., technology that helps people engage government more effectively. It is the distillation of my four years spent building Grassroot, a civic tech platform in South Africa. The guide is focused on the ... more

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Digital Defenders Partnership: Strategy 2020-2023

Hivos (2020), 36 pp.

"Seven years since the establishment of the Digital Defenders Partnership by the Freedom Online Coalition, the challenges to Human Rights and Internet Freedom globally have mounted, while the movements in their defence remain diverse, creative, and resilient. In this context, DDP has evolved to beco ... more

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Building Smart Villages: A Blueprint. As Piloted in Niger

Geneva: ITU (2020), xiv, 57 pp.

"This Smart Village Blueprint, piloted in Niger, has been conceived as a practical tool for establishing smart villages. It contributes to the implementation of the Niger 2.0 Smart Villages project, which aims at providing broadband infrastructure to improve Internet access in rural and remote parts ... more

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Impact Report 2017-2019: Make-IT in Africa. Successfully Promoting Tech Entrepreneurship and the Innovation Ecosystems of Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria and Tunisia

Bonn; Eschborn: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) (2019), 71 pp.

"Make-IT started as a "laboratory" for new types of partnerships between development organisations, business, finance and entrepreneurs. After 2 years of implementation experience, we can proudly say that we have successfully combined the strengths of the public and private sectors to promote digita ... more

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#eSkills4Girls: Eine Initiative zur Förderung digitaler Kompetenzen von Frauen und Mädchen. Rückblick und Perspektiven

Bonn: Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ) (2019), 30 pp.

"Die #eSkills4Girls-Initiative ist im Rahmen der G20-Präsidentschaft Deutschlands im Jahr 2017 entstanden. Ziel der Initiative ist es, die digitale Kluft zwischen Männern und Frauen zu überwinden und insbesondere für Frauen und Mädchen durch digitale Kompetenzen bessere Bildungsund Beschäftigu ... more

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Tech Trendscouting Toolkit: Or How to Become a Tech Trendscout for Digital Innovation with Social Impact in Africa

Asmaa Guedira, Geraldine de Bastion, Tolu Agunbiade, Yatan Blumenthal-Vargas

Bonn; Eschborn: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) (2019), 44 pp.

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Social Tech Ecosystems in Sub-Saharan Africa
Deep Insights

Christopher Csíkszentmihályi, Gemma Rodrigues et al.

Madeira Interactive Technologies Institute (M-ITI) (2018), 86 pp.

"Around the world diverse actors are working to develop technology that directly improves social conditions. This report refers to these types of technology as ‘social tech’. Examples of social tech include anti-corruption systems for citizens to report bribes; communications platforms for refug ... more

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Experiences of ICT Use in Shared, Public Access Settings in Philippine Slums

Cheryll Ruth Soriano, Ruepert Jiel Cao, Marianne Sison

Development in Practice, volume 28, issue 3 (2018), pp. 358-373

"This article examines how privacy is understood, lived, and negotiated by youth users of information and communication technology (ICT) in slum communities in the Philippines. In the context of shared and public access arrangements prevalent in many low-income communities in the Global South, the a ... more

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Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICT4D)
Deep Insights

Richard Heeks

London; New York: Routledge (2018), xviii, 410 pp.

"The first three chapters set out the foundations of ICT4D: the core relation between ICTs and development; the underlying components needed for ICT4D to work; and best practice in implementing ICT4D. Five chapters then analyse key development goals: economic growth, poverty eradication, social deve ... more

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Mobile Internet Skills Training Toolkit: Tigo Rwanda Pilot Evaluation

Alex Smith

GSMA (2017), 37 pp.

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Digital Access in Africa

Chris Locke, Jonathan Donner, Bryan Pon, Savita Bailur, Francis Hook, Ambacontributors Kak

Farnham (UK): Caribou Digital Publishing (2016), 60 pp.

"The mobile industry has, for the past 15 years or so, done a phenomenal job of connecting users in emerging markets to voice, SMS and Internet access services. But as we strive to reach the remaining unconnected users, we may need new models of connectivity to reach them. In the first section of th ... is document we discuss the need for new Internet access models, and ask the question of what we mean by “Internet Access” and why it’s important to understand what the impacts of limited service and capability are. We then move on to look at the barriers to scaling Internet access, and why, despite the availability and affordability of mobile phones, Internet access remains sub-scale. On the supply side, we discuss the issues around the costs of delivery access, and the difficulty of making connectivity affordable. Many attempts to reduce the cost have been tried, with varying levels of success. From Universal Service Funds delivered at a policy level, to zero-rated services from the private sector, it is important to understand the considerations around subsidizing access for poor or hard-to-reach users. The debate around this is nuanced, as the recent decision by the TRAI to ban Facebook Free Basics in India has shown. Supply side barriers are not easily solvable, and some mix of new industry business models and policy efforts to make regulation fit for purpose is required. Providing affordable—or free—Internet access will require negotiating the original principles of the Internet, the desire for an open and fair architecture, with the real costs of delivering this vision. From a user perspective, even when the available infrastructure enables connectivity, it doesn’t always drive adoption. Users require a reason to go online. A certain amount of this can be demand driven by access to essential government services, but a carrot as well as a stick is required. We have previously researched the digital lives of users in Ghana, Kenya, and Uganda, and have shown how users come online for non-instrumental reasons (social media, games, etc.) but then often use these platforms for instrumental activities such as self-directed education, searching for employment, or sourcing essential information.3 User research can show us how these needs can be balanced, and we discuss this within this report." (Introduction, page 4-5) more

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Technology and Society as Embedded: An Alternative Framework for Information and Communication Technology and Development

Natascia Boeri

Media, Culture & Society, volume 38, issue 1 (2016), pp. 107-118

"An emerging topic in the development field is how information and communication technology (ICT) can be used for economic and social development. The general approach relies on technological determinism, whereby the discussion revolves around how and to what extent will ICT support development. It ... more

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Supporting Internet Freedom: The Case of Iran

Sherry Ricchiardi

Washington, DC: Center for International Media Assistance (CIMA) (2014), 24 pp.

"The aim of this report is not to question the value of supporting Internet freedom in closed societies such as Iran. Rather, the intent is to provide a picture of how difficult it is to achieve progress in such countries. In times of tightening budgets for media development work, it is worth consid ... more

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Spider Stories 2012

Katja Sarajeva (ed.)

Kista; Stockholm: Spider – The Swedish Program for ICT in Developing Regions; Stockholm University (2013), 99 pp.

"In Spider Stories 2012 you will get an overview of results from Spider projects initiated in 2011-2012 in collaboration with project partners in Cambodia, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and Uganda. In partnership with local organizations, we have supported innovative projects in democracy, education, and ... more

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Internet Freedom and Political Space

Olesya Tkacheva, Lowell H. Schwartz, Martin C. Libicki, Julie E. Taylor, Jeffrey Martini, Caroline Baxter

Santa Monica, Calif. et al.: RAND Corporation; U.S. Department of State (2013), xxiv, 261 pp.

"This report examines whether and how furthering Internet freedom can empower civil society vis-à-vis public officials, make the government more accountable to its citizens, and integrate citizens into the policymaking process. Using case studies of events in 2011 in Egypt, Syria, China, and Russia ... more

Social Tech Ecosystems in Sub-Saharan Africa Deep Insights

Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICT4D) Deep Insights

Social Tech Ecosystems in Sub-Saharan Africa
Deep Insights

Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICT4D)
Deep Insights