Development and Democracy/Research

In this project, IT for Change, Institute of Development Studies (IDS), and country partners will unpack how micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME) participation in the global economy is increasingly shaped by the rapid deployment of digital technologies (e.g. ERP, RPA, platformized models),…

The context of society- and economy-wide platformization and an expanding spectrum of platform workplaces necessitates a re-think of labor rights at the intersection of data, data-enabled algorithms, and work process reorganization. This working paper takes stock of emerging debates in this…

To commemorate the 10th anniversary of the Tenure Guidelines on sustainable governance adopted by the Committee on World Food Security, FIAN International and the Working Group on Land and Territories of the IPC – a coalition of social movements working on food sovereignty and the Right to Food…

DataSyn is a free monthly newsletter from IT for Change providing concise and relevant analysis on all matters concerning Big Tech. Building on our strong tradition of deep research and policy engagement on the digital economy with a focus on the Global South, DataSyn delivers quality analysis…

The public release of ChatGPT, an AI-powered chatbot by OpenAI, in November 2022, percolated the public consciousness with the disruptive potential, both incredible and iniquitous, of emerging general purpose AI technologies. In the following months, AI has dominated the public discourse and…

Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming the world faster than the world can mitigate intensifying geopolitical divisions and socio-economic disparities. As technological change outpaces regulatory policy, no common platform has yet emerged to coordinate a variety of governance approaches…

This policy brief takes stock of the current multilateral approaches to new 'Digital Public Goods' (DPGs), and provides critical reflections, chalking out some future directions for global and national-level actions, in line with the vision of inclusive development in Agenda 2030.

We…

IT for Change has undertaken a project to frame gender-just design principles for the various components of information systems being used to implement public welfare schemes. This includes the design of citizen-facing applications, data sharing guidelines, and overall database design, among…

As ‘data’ grows to be more clearly recognized as the driving force of the economic transformations of today, and the structuring principle of the economic landscape of the future, discussions around the need for an adequate governance regime are starting to pick up steam. From breaking up Big…

This presentation seeks to outline preliminary insights in integrating gender equality considerations into the design and development of information and data architectures for government programmes, with NRLM's information system as a test case. It focuses on:

- What we know about techno-…

The glass is half full.

Voices of resistance to power are everywhere. Students and young people are taking to the streets; women are infiltrating public discourse; and the unlikely activist is joining popular uprisings. Social movements are rejecting tokenism and ‘woke-washing’ from…

The human body is asserting itself more than as a performative spectacle on the streets. From Hong Kong to India, Catalonia, Lebonan, Chile and many more, the body is a signifier of bio-power and hope, defeating surveillance, courting arrest and deliberately seeking the system’s panoptic gaze.…

Statement of the APRCEM S&T Constituency on COVID-19.

The world is presently facing a global health pandemic as many countries battle the widespread transmission of COVID-19 that has already cost the lives of almost 42,000 and afflicted nearly 858,000 people. The healthcare community…

We are pleased to announce that Fondation Botnar has commissioned IT for Change to develop a framework focusing on ‘Health Data as Global Public Good' that centrally includes community ownership of data into it. The research for this project will lay out the nature, role and governance of health…

As employment in India bounces back from the Covid lockdown, platform-mediated work is expected to come into its own. Indian legislation must take the right steps to protect the status and labour rights of gig workers in these changing times, while unions also need to bring these new workers…