Investigating Technology, Gender and Empowerment
edited by Ineke Buskens and Anne Webb
"Women in Africa are undeniably participating in the information and communication technology (ICT) revolution and they are doing so in many and varied ways; the changes that the use of these tools have brought about are visible everywhere. Furthermore, the prospects of ICTs for development and women’s empowerment seem promising. Yet women’s stories about their experiences and use of these tools are not heard: are their lives changing for the better because of these new technologies? If so, in what ways are they changing? Are there areas in which women could and should participate in this ICT revolution but are not, because they are women? How can women’s perspectives, insights and realities in relation to the use and potentials of ICTs be integrated into ICT policies that are currently being developed and implemented across the continent?"
This book was edited by Ineke Buskens and Anne Webb through the support of the Acacia Programme of the International Development Research Centre (IDRC), which supports research in Africa on information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D), and the Association for Progressive Communications (APC). The book is based on research from a collective of African academics and activists known for their passionate involvement with women’s empowerment and ICTs. The perspectives of the women of Africa needed to be narrated and this knowledge needed to be brought to the world by African researchers.
The book is categorized in four parts:
The women in the chapters in Part One are affected by ICTs in a ‘passive’ way. Their lives have been changed by the various technologies but they are not at all or only in a very limited way able to access and use these tools. These women’s lack of access and use is related to lack of infrastructure (including electricity and hardware), poverty (their main priorities being involved with survival) and illiteracy. These factors are often partly and sometimes completely gender-related. For instance, in some contexts women were affected by ICTs as the technologies had entered their realm through family usage, community access and awareness of potential uses and benefits, even when the women did not actively seek to utilize them. Some technologies were found to be irrelevant, and some a ‘mixed blessing’.
The women respondents in Part Two are benefiting from or would benefit from ‘female-only’ spaces they create for themselves or which could be created for them through and with ICTs. In these spaces they can find refuge, express themselves, learn, network and trade. It seems that in certain situations women’s environments are so seriously gender imbalanced that they do not get the opportunities to enhance their lives and expand their contributions to their societies within existing physical public spaces. The virtual ICT-created spaces would enable women to enjoy and utilize new freedoms. By creating new forms of space – using a cell phone when violence is perpetuated in isolating physical spaces; creating supportive learning and work environments that do not require entering the patriarchal public sphere; enhancing existing advocacy networks – women are creating new options and liberties for themselves. What, however, does the desire for or pursuit of women-only spaces through the use of technologies indicate about women’s choices and engagement with ICTs? How should we look at this desire to separate from rather than confront existing power structures, from a gender equality perspective? Is this an expression of empowerment for the women involved; are these empowering options that they are creating?
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