Mapping revisited & social change theory

Posted by irislapinski on September 5th, 2009

Part 2 of the conclusions. After having explored the digital inclusion value chain and the evolution of technology during my analysis, I had a closer look at the theories of social change underpinning the work of different digital inclusion players. From a CDI point of view this is essential since as an organisation it has always combined technology with citizenship/ social entrepreneurship education.

The first time I noticed that different actors were using different theories of change was when I read Tim Davies‘ analysis and summary of an RSA seminar held in May 2009 on the topic of on Digital Inclusion and Social Capital. This impression was then further confirmed during a conversation with Nick Booth about the sector and his new initiative Help me Investigate. While Tim Davis listed 10 different theories and approaches in his blog entry, I would just like to focus on 4 sub-groups combining some of these approaches:

1. Basic skills & focus on the individual
2. Grass root media & giving people a voice
3. Investing in the connectors/ community activists/ digital mentors
4. Community development/ social entrepreneurship education for everybody

From my point of view these 4 groups give different answers to the same question: How can we achieve social change through technology?

1. Basic skills & focus on the individual

From my point of view this approach is different from the others in the sense that there is no explicit social focus, but that all attention is given to the individual, his or her learning process and achievements in learning technical skills.
Activities: Teach and learn technical skills. Tim described it very well: “deliver packages of tried and tested training in operating computers and the Internet which recipients can then use to develop further engagement. A basic skills approach might cover things like using the mouse, using Windows, visiting a website and sending an e-mail.”
Theory of social change: No explicit one.
Challenges: How to make technocal skills relevant to social context of learners? Limited or no focus on using technology as a tool for democratic and social change.

2. Grass root media & giving people a voice

This approach seeks to give people tools and skills to tell their own stories through digital means, thus to give them a voice in their local communities.
Activities: Train people to express their thoughts and to document their life realities through technology
Theory of social change New voices of previously silent and excluded groups or individuals will attract attention attention of decision makers and influence the public discourse by unlocking local knowledge.
Challenges: How to move from voicing a concern to effective local action? Who is targeted with the new information? Who listens?

3. Investing in the connectors/ community activists

I have grouped slightly different concepts here, but the underlying philosophy is that only a small group of people will actually actively create social change and thus it is most efficient to support these connectors and activists. Or as Tim put it: “Investing in the connectors as the best returns will come when you build links between networks. Connecting networks will drive digital inclusion more than putting funds directly to the most excluded.”
Activities: Identify people who are already involved in community and teach them to use technology, so they can be more effective in achieving social change.
Theory of social change: Existing community activists achieve more social change as individuals
Challenges: How to mobilise people to become active who are not yet mobilised? How to establish new networks for change?

4. Community development/ social entrepreneurship education

There is not necessarily one approach to community development, but the underlying philosophy I would want to focus on is that potentially everybody can become a community activist and that everybody can help to change a system.
Activities: Structured process to make people conscious of their environment and to give them social mobilisation skills including technology
Theory of social change: New networks are created in the community and new people create social change
Challenges: What if people don’t want to become active in their local community? How can people become aware? Is this resource efficient? What if communities are no longer geography based?

As you can see each social change theory faces different challenges and there are different circumstances which make one or the other more suitable or more effective. It’s not a question whether one or the other is right or wrong, but it depends on what is the objective of activity?

So the next thing I did was to re-do my mapping of digital inclusion players along these different theories of change:

In this diagram CDI is alone with its focus on community development and social entrepreneurship education. However, when you look outside the field of digital inclusion, organisations like the Citizenship Foundation and people like Kevin Harris use the same or a very similar philosophical approach.

The next step for me was then to match the theories of social change with technology platforms in order to understand better how  digital inclusion players are positionined. The result of this exercise was this technology & social change matrix:

There are two conclusions you can draw from this:

1. CDI’s approach to social change is probably not used anywhere by existing digital inclusion players in the UK.
2. There are many – and often very good and effective – players involved in provision of IT & Internet skills training as well as in digital media skills training.

Talk About Local‘s approach to combine digital media training with a focus on supporting social enterpreneurs and existing community activists has rightly received a lot of attention in the part few months, since it promises to create significant value. Also David Wilcox‘s Social by Social guide and game is leading edge in this space.

For CDI the conclusion of this exercise was that given the number of strong and successful players in the IT & Internet and digital media spaces, there was little it could effectively contribute – despite its different approach to social change.

The larget opportunity – and the largest experiment – would therefore be to test its social change theory in a space that so far no organisation has consistently occupied: mobile Internet and apps based on smartphones.

In order to illustrate that I’m not completely insane with this suggestion I would like to point to 3 initiatives that have already started to combine mobile applications with social change: FixMyStreet by London-based MySociety, Apps for Democracy by iStrategy Labs in Washington D.C.  and iBurgh by the Pittsburgh municipal public administration.

On the technology development front: When I met him last week Ken Banks from FrontlineSMS told me about current beta-tests for Google’s App Inventor for Android which will hopefully allow non-geeks very soon to build mobile apps…

Based on this analysis the decision for CDI’s prototypes and pilots was taken to create CDI Mobile.

I will be talking about this a bit more during the research launch event in 2 weeks, but any comments on this analysis and mapping are highly welcome!

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