ICTs for Development blog
Catch up on the most recent posts from our Centre for Digital Development blog.
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A Better Way to Research Digital Platforms
Richard Heeks
1 July 2021
In a new European Journal of Development Research paper – “Conceptualising Digital Platforms in Developing Countries as Socio-Technical Transitions” – I and my co-authors argue that there is a better way to research digital platforms. Digital platforms play an ever-growing role within international development, and a body of research has emerged as a result. This research […]
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Digital Platforms as Institutions
Richard Heeks
2 June 2021
How should we understand digital platforms from an institutional perspective? The paper, “Digital Platforms and Institutional Voids in Developing Countries”, suggests a four-layer model of institutional forms, and illustrates this using ride-hailing platforms as an example. Layer 1: Digital Institutions. Platforms themselves are institutions into which digitised routines and rules have been designed based on […]
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How Platforms Change Markets: The Lens of “Institutional Voids”
Richard Heeks
11 May 2021
Do digital platforms change markets for better or worse? To help understand this, we used the lens of institutional voids in the World Development paper, “Digital Platforms and Institutional Voids in Developing Countries”. This argues that markets don’t work properly because they have institutional shortcomings or voids: inadequate provision of information, limited matching of buyers […]
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Digital Platforms as Development Infrastructure
Richard Heeks
20 April 2021
I’m going to argue here that digital platforms should be understood as development infrastructure[1]. In recent years, there’s been a renewed emphasis on the value and role of infrastructure in international development[2]. Official development assistance for infrastructure has therefore risen but there remains a significant infrastructure financing gap[3]. It may be something of an exaggeration […]
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Latest Digital Development Outputs (Data, Humanitarianism, Labour, Platforms) from CDD, Manchester
Richard Heeks
9 March 2021
Recent outputs – on Data-for-Development; Digital Humanitarianism; Digital Labour; Digital Platforms – from Centre for Digital Development researchers, University of Manchester: DATA-FOR-DEVELOPMENT “The Rise of the Data Economy and Policy Strategies for Digital Development” (open access) by Shamel Azmeh, Christopher Foster & Ahmad Abd Rabuh, expands on policy debates around digital development. It examines the […]
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Delivering Urban Data Justice for “Smart Cities 2.0”
Richard Heeks
11 February 2021
What new institutions are needed to ensure smart cities are also data-just cities? Smart City 1.0 “is primarily focused on diffusing smart technologies for corporate and economic interests”. Smart City 2.0 is “a decentralised, people-centric approach where smart technologies are employed as tools to tackle social problems, address resident needs and foster collaborative participation”.[1] Given […]
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Revisiting “Leapfrogging” in a Platformised World
Richard Heeks
11 January 2021
What difference do digital platforms make to the long-standing argument about “leapfrogging” of development by developing countries?[1] The idea that latecomer nations could accelerate their passage through development stages via use of new technology has been around for decades[2]. It was no surprise, then, that leapfrogging played at least some part in turn-of-the-century cheerleading for […]
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Latest Digital Development Outputs (Agriculture, Data, Social Media) from CDD, Manchester
Richard Heeks
18 November 2020
Recent outputs – on Agricultural Platforms; Data-for-Development; Social Media and Education – from the Centre for Digital Development, University of Manchester: AGRICULTURAL PLATFORMS: “Ag-Platforms in East Africa: National and Regional Policy Gaps” (pdf) by Aarti Krishnan, Karishma Banga & Joseph Feyertag identifies national and regional governance deficits (gaps) in the diffusion of digital agricultural platforms, […]
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Digital trade and global governance of the digital economy
Chris Foster
30 October 2020
It is easy to forget that a decade ago, the digital economy was tiny in most countries. This is changing, and in many regions accelerated by the COVID crisis. The global growth of the digital economy has, however, not been matched by the growth of domestic digital firms. Rather, we have seen a growth in […]
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Big data and development in India. The hype and the reality
Chris Foster
8 September 2020
Many around the world celebrated the agreement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and a new agenda for transformative development by 2030. But, practitioners and policy makers were left scratching their heads as to how they were going to monitor the detailed 169 targets and ever more numerous indicators, never mind understanding and achieving these […]
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