India: Intoxicated by Technology

A dozen women in brightly hued salwaar kameez and saris crammed shoulder-to-shoulder in a compact room in the small rural community center. A beaming extension worker in a pressed dhoti ceremoniously lifts the white lace veil covering a table in the corner. A computer glances out from the shadows. The extension worker and his cadre look thrilled; the women seem generally unimpressed.

"We offer the community members training in word processing, book keeping and the Internet", the extension worker explains. "It is better for their businesses".

We have entered an era in which computers and internet communications are hailed as technologies to bridge borders, eliminating geographical boundaries, and promote world-wide communication. From wired homes and offices, we can log on and read newspapers from every continent. I can check my email, and find messages from friends in India, Pakistan, China, Haiti, Africa and Vietnam. We are joining hands in technological globalization.

In community development, the intoxication with technology is no less significant. While technology holds tremendous potential as a tool in community development, we must be careful to consider the context in which it is used. What is the value of the technology? That is – for these women in rural India, what value does the technology hold? Is it empowering them? Is it facilitating an improvement in their lives, or simply serving as a line on a project evaluation as a “benchmark success”?

Alfonso Gomacio-Dragun writes, there is a dangerous belief that if we "place computers and connectivity at the reach of the poor and they will magically defeat poverty. Some international consultants feel good when they arrive to the most isolated villages of Mali or Bolivia with a laptop under their arm, just to show the magic screen in action, the same way the Spaniards used shiny mirrors to subdue the Incas or the Aztecs during the Conquest of America". Gomacio-Dragun goes on to note that, "ICTs are no magic solution for anything, even less in the globalized world we are being dragged into". Not to misrepresent Gomacio-Dragun as a foe of information and communication technology (ICT), he makes the important point that instead of visioning ICTs as the magic panacea to development, "it is urgent that a social vision that puts the Internet at the service of development be strengthened". The challenge is to figure out when the Internet can contribute to development, and when it can impede important processes of community development and social change.

As developed countries fall under the spell of computer technologies, it is important to remember that in developing countries, the predominant communication technology remains the radio, with television slowly gaining momentum. In Tamil Nadu, the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University uses a weekly radio program to disseminate agricultural technologies to farmers across the state. At the university's television and radio production unit, over 147 programs have been produced to educate farmers about innovations in agricultural practices, new seeds, or improved technologies. As farm radio networks across Africa can attest, this is not an unusual phenomenon: radio is one of the most popular tools in communication for social change. It can reach people in remote areas, in local languages, and connect them with information otherwise unavailable to them.

And yet, with the cult of the computer, even with effective and accessible tools available, Gomacio-Dragun notes that, "for digital wars – as for the real wars – small countries spend more than they can afford to buy modern technology (or weapons) from industrialized countries interested in keeping the wars going forever. It's good for the economy (theirs, of course)".

So, where is the middle ground? At the risk of grossly oversimplifying the discussion, we can state it simply: on one hand are ICTs with tremendous potential and on the other are small community centers with dusty computers few know how to use. That is to say, we have potentially beneficial technology that is being applied in community development simply for the sake of saying, "See how advanced we are. We have community centers with computers and Internet access".

This doesn't always need to be the case. When issues such as local ownership, local content, appropriate technology, language and cultural pertinence, convergence, and networking are taken into account, computers and connectivity can be potent tools. In Chennai, Tamil Nadu, the M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation provides connectivity, but also develops local content in Village Knowledge Centers that enable users to access information that matches their needs. In Sri Lanka, the Kothmale Community Radio uses the Internet to provide information over the radio. Listeners can call into the station to request information, and the station will search the Internet, store information relevant to local audiences, and broadcast the search results to listeners in local languages. If the goal is effective use of computer technology, co-operation and convergence with NGOs and existing communications technologies is vital.

We must also learn to consider context: computers, connectivity, communications… each of these will look different in different regions of the world. Is this such a tragedy? Each country is unique, with a particular set of needs in a particular set of circumstances. Rather than try to fit their needs into a cookie-cutter image of one use of technology, why not let the technology fit their needs?

It may seem overly simplistic, but the dusty community centre in the rural community centre should remind us that buying a technological package can be an exercise in waste. The ideology of computers and connectivity has been created by the developed North: there are more Internet accounts in London, England than in the whole of Africa. Africa and the Middle East together account for only 1% of global Internet users. 90% of Internet users are in industrialized countries. If we want computers and connectivity to be useful tools of communication outside of the North, we must change our vision of their applications, utility, and possibilities. We must reorient ourselves from technology-driven development to socially-driven technology.

Steve Cisler describes this vision as "citizen networks": "What are citizen networks? Internet technology projects that benefit people as citizens rather than as consumers; projects that help marginalized groups have more control over their existence, and even give them a stronger sense of identity. Citizen networks are about inclusion and how the technology can be used for democratic goals and for economic development."


For more information about communication and development, refer to:

www.devmedia.org
www.comminit.com
Making Waves: Stories of Participatory Communication for Social Change at: www.rockfound.org/display.asp?context=1&Collection=3&DocID=423&Preview=0&ARCurrent=1
Take Five: a handful of essentials for ICTs and development by Alfonso Gumucio-Dragun:
www.geocities.com/agumucio/ArtTakeFive.html