Source (logo): Duffy et al. (2008) Source (text): De Vries (2006)
d] There is a focus on social justice, based on an awareness of power relations and the politics of participation and marginalisation, from a rights-based perspective.
e] Both emphasise the need to make local voices heard, building on local organisations as well as local capacity and responsibility to affect change.
f] Both provide empowering physical community spaces for social interaction.
g] Both heed past lessons from theory and practice. CDI has avoided a number of pitfalls identified with regard to the provision of telecentres and the technological DD approach.
ReflectICTs has retained the principles and practice of transformative political PA.
The examples of CDI and ReflectICT indicate that development interventions that make use of ICTs within a shared local social space can be successful when the aim is to address locally defined issues of inequality and injustice through participatory processes that are informed by a recognition of unequal power relations. Both CDI and ReflectICT use a human agency approach, employing ICTs as tools to serve locally defined needs and goals. As such, they are examples of the practice of participation that focuses on QoL, ICTs, agency and empowerment.
4.5.3 Synergies between QoL, ICTs, PMs and Empowerment
People-centred strategies and technologies are needed to make ICT4D a model for people-centred development. (Hamel, 2010:60).
PMs have been used to explore well-being and QoL for decades and Chapter 2 presented agency and empowerment as important for individual pursuit of a better self- defined QoL, as well as an important part of the definition of a good QoL. Chapter 4 presented a concept of participation with the fundamental objectives of empowering the marginalised and challenging social injustice (based on individual and group agency), with the ultimate goal of improving self-defined well-being. This links QoL, PMs and
empowerment (through agency).
In the last decade, PMs have been increasingly used to implement ICT4D interventions and research. Chapter 3 presented ICT use as enabling participation, information and communication, which directly link to Kleine’s agency resources, namely information, educational and social resources (especially from the perspective of education, socialisation and communication as similar and intertwined concepts. Inner empowerment (e.g.
Table 4-6: Core aspects of ICT4D (and CI) 1. Justice &
Equality The focus of ICTs provision, access and use is to decrease human inequality and promote social justice.
2. Context The context of provision, access and use is most relevant.
3. Basic
Needs ICT use can facilitate human needs for information, socialisation and inclusion.
4. Tools ICTs are tools for use as needed to address local needs, promoting agency and empowerment.
5. Resources Effective ICT use recognizing the realities of poor people’s lives requires a range of resources.
6. Skills Different types of skills are required, for relevant, goal-focused use.
7. Complexity
& Diversity Participatory approaches and logic
modeling assist with analyzing the multiple, complex and diverse links between ICT use and human development.
8. State &
Human Rights
Government has a responsibility to deliver ICT access to marginalized groups, based on ICT use as a human right (or at least as central to accessing human rights).
increased self-esteem, motivation and self-efficacy) directly linked Kleine’s psychological resources, is critical to agency and to empowerment. Evidence (albeit limited) of
psychological empowerment, as well as evidence of increases in other resources due to ICT use, links effective ICT use with agency and empowerment, as illustrated through the CF.
With access to information, education, freedom of expression and freedom of opinion as human rights (UN, 1948) this places ICT use as a tool to realise human rights and improve QoL. Much of the recent articulation of a human development approach to ICT4D theory is mutually supportive and complementary. Eight core aspects of current ICT4D theory set out in section 3.4 (and mirrored in definitions of CI) are summarised in Table 4-6, illustrating shared aspects and concepts across the theory of QoL, PMs, empowerment (through agency) and ICT4D.
The range of unique combinations means that development outcomes that emerge are varied and unpredictable. Therefore, it is difficult to trace causality linking ICT use to socio- economic impact and development
outcomes. Due to this complexity, logic models are useful for planning and analysing ICT4D interventions.
Of the many current ICT4D logic models and frameworks, Kleine’s CF is the most comprehensive, illustrating an iterative process linking the structures in the surrounding context, individual characteristics and agency resources with development outcomes, through a process of individual choice and action, which can be empowering. Like CI, Kleine’s model is applicable to development in general, beyond ICTs. Kleine models centres on
empowerment with QoL reflected in development outcomes. Kleine’s model also addresses, specifically, Hickey and Mohan (2005) criticism that participation does not take sufficient account of structure and agency.
Numerous aspects of the current ICT4D theory reflect a central place for a
participatory approach to ICT4D interventions and research, and the active and creative engagement of ICT users beyond technology. PMs have processes and methods to
accommodate complexity - a feature of QoL; agency and empowerment; and ICTs and ICT4D.
Internationally recognised best practise reflects the synergy that can result from a human agency approach to promote pro-poor development inclusive of ICT use and participatory methodologies. The examples included in subsection 4.5.2, illustrate the concurrent application of ICT4D, QoL and human agency theory, where synergies arise because of the following shared perspectives:
a] both a means to an end and an end in itself;
b] characterised by diversity and complexity;
c] adapt, reflect and evolve around the local context (and cannot be prescribed from outside);
d] remain unique to the individual, even though many activities, goals, views and outcomes may be shared; and
e] can result in pro-poor local development when used by the marginalised and excluded.
Chapters 2, 3 and 4 have thus set the theoretical basis for CLIQ as a par project that aimed to empower people through ICT use and to support them through interaction and reflection to improve their QoL. The scope of the theoretical review in Chapters 2, 3 and 4, does not allow for a review of findings regarding QoL, empowerment, ICT use and the practice of participatory methodologies in SA. Appendix C (p313) provides a brief insight into some findings in this regard, which indicate a] continuing gender and racial inequality with respect to QoL; b] a racial and gendered DD; and c] persistent problems national government’s effort to facilitate with PAC in SA. The following chapter describes the design and implementation of CLIQ, after a brief view into the paradigms underlying the
methodological approach. The chapter presents information on what was done, where it was done, when it was done, how it was done, and who was involved.$$$$$$
CHAPTER FIVE:
IMPLEMENTING CLIQ
5 IMPLEMENTING CLIQ
People’s experiences, beliefs and hopes are reflected in their daily activities, thoughts and behaviour (Bandura, 1989). This applies to people who are being researched – the participants, respondents, subjects, sample, etc. – as well as the people implementing the research (e.g. researchers, fieldworkers and translators). Thus information collected as data from participants encompasses their biases, and when analysing and linking data to existing theory, the search for a theory of ‘best fit’ is biased by the worldview of the researcher.
Advancing strong objectivity, Sandra Harding (1993:69) argues that “...the subject of the knowledge be placed on the same critical, causal plane as the objects of knowledge”
because the values of the researcher (subject) are reflected in the selection of questions, design of the research, analysis of data, and so on. Therefore, researchers need to identify and reflect on their own beliefs, values and desires, as these become integrated into the research (Harding, 1993:55-70). My worldview and experiences influenced the design of the CLIQ process, as well as the selection of theory for further analysis of findings. Below, I briefly outline aspects of critical theory and the constructivist paradigm, within and across which, the CLIQ approach is located.
Approaches to knowledge generation vary according to what can be known, how it can be known and the relationship between those that know and those that want to find out.
An approach’s conceptual stance on these questions of ontology, methodology and
epistemology determine whether it falls within the positivist, post-positivist, critical theory (and close relations) or constructivism paradigm (Guba and Lincoln, 1994:108-109).
Participatory inquiry, along with feminism, neo-Marxism and materialism, is part of the critical theory paradigm (ibid:109), which contests that what can be known about reality is
mediated by social, political, cultural, ethnic, economic and gender values.46 Constructivism differs most from critical theory with regard to ontology and this is the specific aspect of constructivism that informs my approach. Constructivists assume “...multiple
apprehendable and sometimes conflicting social realities that are products of human intellects, but that may change as their constructors become more informed and sophisticated” (Guba and Lincoln, 1994:111). This supports how a person can give two different answers to a similar question when asked at a different time or in a different context and still be confident that they are being true to what they know.
In terms of methodology and epistemology, critical theory and constructivism are similar. Both have a transactional/ subjectivist assumption regarding the role of the researchers, where the concept of an objective researcher is rejected. Rather researchers’
impact on the reality being researched is recognised. Both paradigms also imply a
“...dialectic[al] methodology aimed at the reconstruction of previously held constructions”
(Guba and Lincoln, 1994:112). In other words it is through a process of interaction between researcher and researched, that a particular version of past reality, is recalled and
presented. Specifically with regard to the researcher’s role, critical theory’s “transformative intellectual” who facilitates change “...as individuals develop greater insight into the existing state of affairs …and are stimulated to act on it” (Guba and Lincoln, 1994:115) best describes the role I played in CLIQ. While I might prefer to have been a “passionate participant” - a constructivist’s view of the role of the researcher – the socio-economic and historical
context of the research did not allow for this. Just as researchers and fieldworkers influence the focus and findings of an inquiry, so too do the research methods and processes adopted, which become part of the research context:
46 Guba and Lincoln’s revision of inquiry paradigms (2005:192), adds “participatory” as a fifth paradigm, while their 1994 edition placed participatory under critical theory, where they recognise that distinct definitions of the various paradigms were still under debate (Guba and Lincoln, 1994:109). I found the four alternatives most useful in analysing where CLIQ fitted best, particularly with respect to epistemology. If I had first viewed the five alternatives (2005:195), I would probably not have thought much about CLIQ ‘s paradigm, as it would have fitted immediately under the fifth “participatory” paradigm. I am more comfortable with the four-way split, finding the debate on location of participatory practice between constructivist and critical theory very useful for interrogating the concepts underpinning an approach. Therefore, I do not use the updated 2005 version of five paradigms. Limitations of space do not allow me to pursue this issue further here.
Context is not the “bed” in which processes are embedded. Such a view would suggest that you can lift processes out of a given “local context” and replicate, scale-up, roll-out or whatever ... Processes themselves shape and frame context and in so doing, become part of “context” themselves. (Kleine, 2010a:5)
CLIQ employed a participatory approach, therefore the discussion in chapter 4 has already provided a sense of the ethos and principles that CLIQ aspired to when engaging with research partners, participants and other stakeholders. As the area-specific processes unfolded over a period of about two years, CLIQ became part of the research context, as is common with processes of engagement over time. This chapter proceeds with a description of the four areas where CLIQ was implemented, the design and implementation of the research process, and the groups of participants that took part. CLIQ methods, ethos and process are presented in some detail, because this thesis considers the impact of the practical implementation of the research, on the outcomes.
The national context of the CLIQ research was one of high racial and gender inequality with respect to QoL, based on a history of racial and gender discrimination and oppression (among other forms or oppression), which was entrenched in the legal, social, cultural, political and economic structures and institutions of South African society. The post-1994 period saw the steady destruction of formal laws and policies perpetuating discrimination and inequality, as well as some progress towards less discriminatory informal norms, behaviours and attitudes.
for such collaboration. Together, these reasons indicated USAASA as a most suitable research partner. We envisaged that CLIQ would produce outcomes that closely
approximated reality, because the research would take place at existing state-supported telecentres, in environments filled with everyday problems and possibilities. Furthermore, as part of national government’s established structures for ICT delivery, research findings would have a ready-made audience given that USAASA was the appropriate state institution to consider and implement any policy related findings.47
Four research sites were chosen for the research under the guidance of USAASA’s KwaZulu-Natal representative who was aware of the functionality, management and locale of all provincial USAASA-linked telecentres. The research sites were: eNyakatho, an urban township near Durban; eNingizimu, a peri-urban area near Amanzimtoti on the KZN south coast; eMpumalanga, a rural area near Mangusi in the northern KZN coastal area; and eNtshonalanga, a rural area near Richmond, inland of Durban (see Plate 5-1). The sites were purposively selected to ensure an equal spread between urban and rural areas; to locate the research at telecentres that were functional (or deemed soon-to-be functional); and to focus the research on the provision of ICTs within resource-poor communities. The descriptions of the research areas and telecentres that follow draw on my fieldwork experiences in each area and on participants’ views and information about their area.48
47 While the KZN USAASA representative assisted at key times, CLIQ’s partnership with USAASA fell well short of our minimum hopes and hardly touched on the possibilities opened up by the CLIQ process or findings.
48 A socio-economic overview of each area is included in the CLIQ Community report (CLIQ-participants et al.,2011:14-21), based on secondary research done by CLIQ research assistants.
5.1.1 eMpumalanga Area and Telecentre
eMpumalanga is located in the northern part of KZN, in the uMhlabuyalingana municipality (uMkhanyakude District) – see Plate 5-1. eMpumalanga residential area is located on both sides of the main road that links the town of Jozini to Manguzi and is four kilometres away from a game reserve which is marketed as an international tourist
destination (see Figure 5-1). Many tourists pass through eMpumalanga to reach Mangusi,