Reforming Tech & Democracy Programs for the Global Majority

Picture: Global Technology for Social Justice Lab

In an article by Global Technology for Social Justice Lab, Jonathan Corpus Ong, Jose Mari Lanuza, Dean Jackson, Marcelo Alves, Rafael Grohmann, Raquel Recuero, and Camilla Tavares critique the top-down approach of Global North-driven tech and democracy initiatives, advocating for bottom-up, custom-built solutions that genuinely address the needs and contexts of Global Majority countries.

Global North philanthropies contributed over US$1 billion in media, information, and technology to aid recipient countries between 2017 and 2021 (Ordoñez, 2024). This is not even counting the foreign aid extended by Global North governments to “advance technology for democracy” around the world. The outcome of this investment is a high quantity of top-down, tools-and-tech-first, and short-term projects that do not always support the diverse skill sets, cultural expertise, and movement-building goals of in-country civil society organizations.

The Global Majority is often represented as a “digital dystopia” in global media storytelling and the advocacy of Global North tech accountability spokespersons. While this popular frame triggers public indignation and mobilizes political action, it often reinforces inequalities of voice between Global North field leaders and Global Majority implementors of standardized programs or case study authors. For Global Majority civil society veterans, this power imbalance fosters activist burnout and disillusionment with tech and democracy programs as a mere “donor fad.”

Global Majority civil society leaders seek a localization agenda in the tech and democracy space where research questions and program design could become more bottom-up and long-term, and coalitions could become more inclusive, just, and supportive of the younger and precarious frontline tech workers of civil society organizations (CSOs).

Global Majority civil society leaders report several underfunded programs and space-building opportunities, such as efforts to organize and protect the rights of tech workers, targeted voter literacy initiatives that facilitate community healing and deliberative agency, strategic litigation opportunities against local top-level disinformers, and collaborative spaces between researchers and practitioners within the Global Majority and across the Global North and Global Majority.

Global North donors and collaborators must be mindful that extractive modes of research and advocacy impose real setbacks to the goals of local coalitions. Respondents identified how “parachute” tech and democracy programs that only convene for elections or crisis events may disrupt long-term policy goals, divert organizational missions, flatten out methodological diversity, and even alienate local audiences and voters.