Policy briefs

Computer learning programmes in schools (CLPS) in India have largely failed to achieve their goals of positively impacting learning processes and outcomes in schools. Implemented usually through 'PPP' (Public Private Partnership) models, these programmes have been treated largely as  silos. Schools and teachers have not seen  computer learning as an integral part of education, and the overall education processes, which has compromised their ownership over, and engagement with the programme.

This paper was contributed for a report prepared for the United Nations Global Alliance for ICT and Development (UN GAID) Global Forum on Access and Connectivity in least developed countries and small islands developing states in Asia/Pacific and innovative financing mechanisms for ICTD, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, on 18-20 May 2008. This paper explores the meanings of women's empowerment and gender equality in the information society, looking at the opportunity for progressive change and critically unpacking the ICTD discourse on gender and development.

This policy brief was originally prepared as an expert input for the 'Regional Conference on Delivering Social Protection to Unorganised Workers', held in Bengaluru (India) in November 2010, and organised by the Department of Labour (Government of Karnataka) and GTZ (Germany). It explores the different ways in which Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are used in social protection systems in India. It then builds upon different models to advocate for the transformative use of ICTs for social protection which would be community-centred rather than based on tactical choices.

This paper is a contribution to the Second Administrative Reforms Commission on 'Citizen Centric Governance'. The paper introduces e-governance in the Indian context and provides suggestions both from the strategic level to implementation on how the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) can improve governance and service delivery. This document was made possible through research support by the PAN ASIA programme of UNDP-APDIP and IDRC (Canada).

This paper was prepared for the United Nations Global Alliance for ICT and Development (UNGAID) Global Forum on Access and Connectivity: Innovative Funding for ICT for Development (Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia) in May 2008 The analysis captures the significance of a rights-based approach to ICTD, which can provide a new point of anchor to develop its theory, policy frameworks and practice, while mainstreaming into ‘development’ with its central ethos of equity, social justice and participatory methods.

This paper was written for the second IGF – Access Plenary Panel (Rio de Janeiro, 2007). It posits that ICTD models for poor people cannot be driven by financial considerations, and neither can they be demand-driven. Access to ICTs for the information poor has a very direct impact on their development status; consequently, ICTs cannot be conceptualised merely as business infrastructure. They instead need to be seen as development infrastructure. This calls for state intervention for creating an ecosystem which makes access to ICTs by marginalised communities a real possibility.

In this piece written for the South Centre Bulletin (issue 5, December 2007), Parminder Jeet Singh and Gurumurthy Kasinathan highlight Internet governance issues that are important from a development perspective. The World Summit on Information Society was the first step towards debating issues of Internet governance and its recommendation on the setting up of the Internet Governance Forum which heads into its third year at Hyderabad is an important space which discusses issues of Internet governance.

IT for Change presented a paper titled 'Project development for expanding women's digital opportunities: some reflections' at the Policy and Strategy for Digital Opportunities from the Gender Perspectives organised by the Asian Pacific Women's Information Network Center (APWINC) in Seoul (South Korea) in July 2006. In this paper, Anita Gurumurthy analyses the necessary link between project definition and policy making, arguing that policies need to serve project objectives, as much as they determine them.

In this article, Anita Gurumurthy and Parminder Jeet Singh analyse the way in which the emphasis on Internet governance and its high visibility in the WSIS process tended to take focus away from the important issue of exploring how the Internet can address long-standing development issues.