Research papers

Owing to the increase in mobile penetration and availability of cheaper internet, mobile usership in rural India is growing rapidly. According to the National Family Health Survey 2019-21 (NFHS-5), 91.5% of rural households in India now have a mobile phone – an increase of 4.2% when compared to the findings of the NFHS-4 (2015-16). On the other…

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 frontier domain of workers’ data rights, evaluating…

IT for Change undertook a research study of hateful, abusive and problematic speech on Twitter directed at 20 Indian women in public-political life. The mixed-method inquiry set out to investigate not only the scale, but also the nature of such pervasive online gendered violence.

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On 24 March 2020, the Government of India announced one of the most stringent lockdowns to combat the spread of Covid-19. Overnight, workers in the unorganized sector — comprising over 90 % of the country’s population —  lost their jobs as projects that employed them came to a halt and supply chains got interrupted. The subsequent lockdowns…

‘Mahiti’ (translates to ‘information’ in Kannada) is a term that reverberates through the villages of Mysuru district, Karnataka. The term resonates most with women who have a quest for knowledge and are keen to access information on health, agriculture, economic opportunities, and public schemes. Different women have different demands and…

This think-piece explores the development implications of using algorithmic scoring models as tools of financial inclusion. It aims to engage with the use of such models not as a technological transformation underpinned by Big Data and machine learning, but as a fundamental political shift reflected in the willingness to dispense the task of…

The 23rd working paperfor Data Governance Network by Anita Gurumurthy and Nandini Chami presents the building blocks of an economic governance regime for data that can contribute to the growth of the digital economy by unlocking the potential of data. The de facto enclosure of data by platform monopolies not only creates a skewed market place…

We are excited to publish a brand new issue paper under our collaborative Feminist Digital Justice project with DAWN (Development Alternatives with Women for a New Era).

Read it here!

The seventh issue paper, authored by Kumudini Samuel, Florencia Partenio, and Cai Yiping from DAWN, explores feminist digital activism in the Global…

In June 2021 Google and BYJU’S announced a partnership to provide education services in India. A press release from BYJU’S said, “the simplicity, flexibility, and security of Google ‘Workspace for Education’ and BYJU’S unmatched content pedagogy come together on the ‘Vidyartha’…

Anita Gurumurthy, Khawla Zainab, and Sadhana Sanjay conducted a study of Indian women workers on Amazon Mechanical Turk (AMT) in the post-pandemic moment, and this research report extensively lays out its rationale, process, and findings. Through a qualitative study based on interviews with AMT workers, the report shows how an intertwining of…