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Cited by 61ICT in Developing CommunitiesGender and Technology in EducationICT Impact and Policies

Negotiating Women’s Agency through ICTs: A Comparative Study of Uganda and India

Masika, Rachel, Bailur, Savita·2015·Gender, Technology and Development
DOI 10.1177/0971852414561615
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Abstract

In the early wave of optimism surrounding “ICTs and development” beginning 2000, much attention was paid to the potential of ICTs for empowering women. It was suggested that new technologies could help marginalized women in developing countries in areas ranging from agriculture to education, empowering women both economically and socially. However, subsequent research illustrated that such a straight outcome was not always the case. ICT interventions could equally result in a negligible or even negative impact on existing gender relations. This research argues a third point: In many cases women decide the extent to which they will adopt a particular technology on the basis of how they think it will affect the gender equilibrium. Based on our respective doctoral fieldwork on the use of mobile phones by female street traders in urban Uganda and an IT center and community radio in rural India, we ask: How strategically do women in developing countries negotiate agency through ICTs? Through these two case studies, we apply two concepts of agency, namely, “adaptive preference” and “patriarchal bargain” to understand how women decide to adopt ICTs. Empowerment through ICTs is not unproblematic, nor is it impossible; it is, however, illustrative of contextual, situated agency.

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  • Western AI fairness is becoming a universal ethical framework, while AI strategies in India, Tunisia, Mexico, and Uruguay espouse fairness but pay less attention to local fairness.

    “Conventional western AI fairness is becoming a universal ethical framework for AI; consider the AI strategies from India [1], Tunisia [205], Mexico [129], and Uruguay [13] that espouse fairness and transparency, but pay less attention to what is fair in local contexts.”

    From Re-imagining Algorithmic Fairness in India and Beyond (2021) · cites this paper as [129]

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Authors
Masika, R., & Bailur, S.
Affiliations
  • University of Brighton (GB)
  • London School of Economics and Political Science (GB)
Corresponding author
Bailur, Savita
ORCID
Masika, Rachel
Venue
Gender, Technology and Development
Publisher
Informa UK Limited
Published
2015-01
Volume
19
Issue
1
Pages
43-69
ISSN
  • 0971-8524 (ISSN-L)
  • 0973-0656
DOI
10.1177/0971852414561615
OpenAlex
W1993788888
Cited by
61
References
56
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 4 · 2024: 5 · 2023: 2 · 2022: 8 · 2021: 6 · 2020: 12 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 8 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 4
FWCI
12.58
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Licence
journals.sagepub.com/page/policies/text-and-data-mining-license (tdm)
Locations
  • Gender Technology and Development (publishedVersion)
  • University of Brighton Repository (University of Brighton) (submittedVersion)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › ICT in Developing Communities
  • Social Sciences › Gender Studies › Gender and Technology in Education
  • Physical Sciences › Engineering › Media Technology › ICT Impact and Policies
Keywords
women's agency, women's empowerment, gender relations, adaptive preferences, patriarchal bargain, technology adoption, mobile devices, community radio, Uganda, India, situated agency

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