The Challenge of “Sustainability” in ICT4D – Is Bricolage the Answer?

This 19-page paper, presented at the 9th International Conference on Social Implications of Computers in Developing Countries, São Paulo, Brazil, discusses sustainability of information and communication technology (ICT) for development projects. It analyses two contrasting ICT for development case studies, both of which ended in “unsustainability” with regards to their original aims, but which resulted in unintended consequences. The authors argue that sustainability is an unrealistic concept, which is difficult to operationalise, and that ICT for development literature must be open to bricolage and improvisation.

According to the document, ICT for development literature distinguishes between five main types of sustainability: financial, social, institutional, technological, and environmental. The authors cite examples showing the discrepancy between ideal plans for information systems and the realities of their implementation. They present the notion of rethinking the concept of sustainability to support the theory of working with the unintended consequences of technology using improvisation and bricolage. "The process called bricolage is characterised as “…tinkering through the combination of resources at hand. These resources become the tools and they define in situ the heuristic to solve the problem. 'Let the world help you': bricolage is about leveraging the world as defined by the situation. With bricolage, the practices and the situations disclose new uses and applications of the technology...Bricolage allows people at the local level to apply known tools and routines at hand to solve new problems."

The case studies present evidence from interviews of 1) academics using ICT-based resources, (including computers, internet facilities, access to electronic journals in various disciplines) to help improve the quality, as well as quantity, of its research output in Saudia Arabia, and 2) a wide variety of stakeholders involved in the implementation of the Our Voices telecentre, a community radio and information technology (IT) centre in South India. In the case of Saudia Arabian academic resources, the authors focused on one aspect of the ICT-based resources: the unlimited access to electronic journals - examining both the extent to which it had empowered the Saudi research community and the extent to which the access to these resources was sustained. The authors found that little use was made of these electronic resources because of resistance among the academic community to technology usage and time limitations on their research due to a teaching responsibilities. The resistance to using the ICT resources stemmed from limited technical skills in using ICT, language barriers to accessing research on the internet, lack of training in browsing electronic libraries, and a perception, suggested to be generational, that internet resources were not legitimate academic resources. However, the unintended uses of the internet included "e-mail communication not only for administration but also for having closely knit discussion groups. In addition, many of the academics were happy to be involved in an Arab-American dialogue programme for university students. Other uses included reading the news online, browsing for materials to support their current teaching, and online book shopping." The authors suggest that the use of the internet for research did not fit the socio-cultural context or "local relevance", and thus was not sustainable; but there were uses that fit the academic community and were sustained.

In the case of 'our Voices', the objective was to create a community-led radio station. "roject implementers stated that "by providing information about employment, better farming techniques and health we hoped for new sustainable job opportunities, improved farming knowledge and healthier life.... Programme topics include the medicinal value of local plants; road governance, sanitation and women’s health.” However, due to the illegal status of community radio in India at the time of the research, the station, which relied upon loud speaker broadcast through a cable television connection, had been displaced in the village by the ability to receive 80 television channels. The lack of sustainability of the radio station, according to the authors, was mainly due to the discrepancy between what the donors and non-governmental organisation implementers wanted to provide - information - and what the audience wanted - entertainment.


The authors conclude that it is difficult to anticipate what factors would make a project unsustainable, but that unintended consequences may make a project more sustainable if bricolage is accepted by the implementers, and that, in such situations, those affected by ICT for development initiatives should be allowed to be 'bricoleurs'.