Is information technology an appropriate technology for the Third World? Its environmental benefits have already been touted (and debated) in the First World. Some people suggest that it produces little pollution, almost no waste (the 'paperless office'), and uses abundant raw materials (silicon, made from common sand.) On the other hand, the 'clean rooms' of Silicon Valley produce a number of toxic chemical byproducts in their processes of chip etching and production; most of the elements in computer construction (plastic and metals) are virtually nonrecyclable (plus the technology has such rapid obsolescence); and the electricity for computer systems still comes from plants burning fossil fuels and batteries containing toxic acids. The U.S. Department of Energy only mandated energy efficiency in computer monitors beginning in 1994. The postindustrial information economy still requires a large amount of basic centralized industrial processes, from the manufacture of precision machine tools to fossil-fuel powered component transportation and distribution.
Further, there are unanswered questions about the viability of the laying of thousands of miles of underground copper or fiber optic cable, especially in geologically sensitive areas. And also about the possible human health effects of the low-level electromagnetic low-frequency (ELF) fields produced by electrical wiring and computer equipment. Foregoing the omnipresent communication cables may mean saturation of the air by countless frequencies of radio and microwave radiation, which has already led to great controversy in the First World. Both the basic bandwidth available in the usable electromagnetic frequencies, and the room to launch communication sattellites in a geosynchronous orbit, are limited, nonrenewable resources. Some commentators note that if the Third World matched the level of sattellite launches found in the First World, the zone around the Earth might become even more filled with "space junk" than it is now, posing tremendous hazards for future space exploration.
This is without even touching on issues relating to ergonomics, privacy, etc. However, there are some positive arguments for information technology which do even out these multiple negative environmental consequences. Even the 'alternative' energy sources have their drawbacks (wind power kills birds, etc.) and nothing is a panacea. In overcrowded, urban areas in the Third World, infotech makes possible 'telecommuting,' reducing transportion gridlock and automobile pollution. It lowers levels of noise pollution also (although some printers do make still make an awful racket.) The most important contributions will come from its applications, like remote sensing and geographical information systems (GIS), which give nations the broad perspective to monitor and maintain their natural resources. However, all such applications are (as with any technology) potentially double-edged; multinational corporations use the same GIS data to locate and extract oil, coal, and other resources.
Certainly, satellite photos make very visible and evident the large amounts of deforestation and desertification going on in the Third World. From space, the amount of topsoil being lost through the Amazon into the Atlantic becomes painfully visible as a large murky cloud. It is computer-based global atmospheric modelling that allowed scientists to identify, measure, and eventually devise solutions for problems such as ozone depletion and global climate change. GIS modelling allows countries to identify the point sources of pollution, and identify areas for safe waste disposal. Biodiversity loss can be measured. Infotech will never substitute for human ingenuity and determination in solving these problems, but in the Third World, pressed for resources to deal with environmental problems, it can at least help identify, visualize, and prioritize those problems.
The reasons for this are evident. Modems cost four times as much in India than they do in the U.S. A "low-end" personal computer represents an investment of many years' salary for agricultural laborers in Indonesia. Most of the computers in the Third World (outside of those used by multinational corporations) are mainframes and microcomputers bought by governments or large firms which rely on a large deal of technical expertise, assistance, maintenance, and components from the First World, and thus for those reasons are often sitting underused or unused. In many African nations, there are fewer than one telephone for every 100 persons, as compared to many parts of the industrialized world, in which due to fax, pagers, cellular, personal communicators, etc., there are more telephones than people. The global language of the Internet is English, with ASCII adaptations for non-Indo-European alphabets (such as Arabic or Chinese) almost impossible to find.
Many rural areas in the developing world have a remarkably small number of televisions and radios, as compared to the developed world. Such dichotomies have suggested that these areas receive little broadcast media, let alone other forms of communication. With the exceptions of India and Brazil, much of the developing world lacks a true domestic microelectronics and computer industry, the space technology to launch communications sattellites, or the storage capacity to maintain national databanks and databases. Most countries also lack the facilities and personnel for teaching their populations basic computer literacy, let alone concepts in advanced telecommunication. Even where the conditions for infrastructure are present, however, there is often a lack of programmers to create software for systems, thus forcing the reliance on software written in the First World.
Software developers like global giant Microsoft often try and create software suited for the needs of the developing world, but inevitably fall short. Many users complain that manuals are not written in their native language (and neither is the source code for the software or the screen interface) and that Western software often has some of the same ethnocentric flaws that other forms of technological media do. Numerous commentators in the Third World have suggested that the 'desktop' interface found on so many personal computers' operating systems may make for ease of use by white collar office workers, but it also presents mostly confusion for rural agriculturalists. The dependence on the West for support with regard to computing, in terms of hardware, software, and training, has led much of the developing world to frustration. Rather than providing autonomy, it has become yet one more part of underdevelopment and dependency.
While the First World has already gone through its "future shock," and seems to be surviving it ably, the Third World is being forced into a dangerous catchup game. As the First World invents and abandons various information technologies, its cast-offs become the mainstays of rural Third World economies, which are now awash in Beta VCRs, CB radios, videotex and telex terminals, analog technology, and time-sharing systems. Combined with the fact of the many existing competing standards and protocols in various technological areas (which the International Telecommunications Union ably tries to regulate in the search for cooperation), this results in the dilemma of nightmarish communication incompatibilities. Numerous developing societies have ordered computer systems to coordinate various aspects of their economy, only to discover in horror that these systems were totally incompatible with their existing infrastructure.
However, infotech is likely to help make institutions like the World Bank obsolete. The major planners in development have been the development banks, UN, national governments, and other big centralized institutions. This is because in the 50s and 60s only such big 'players' were able to coordinate and communicate strategies. But infotech is a decentralizing, destabilizing force. Now, Nongovernmental Organizations (NGOs), new social movements in the First and Third World, and other organs of civil society across the globe are also able to share information, ideas, and strategies. Indigenous people across the globe are using communication networks to discover their common problems and discuss a common agenda. Anti-development activists are able to compare and contrast the successes and failures of development projects all over the planet, drawing on the past 40 years as a reservoir of experience.
Local "free-nets" are replacing the town meetings of old as ways for members of local communities to discuss problems and control their destiny. Freenets help community members obtain critically important medical, legal, and other advice. Rather than passively accepting development plans, communities in the Third World now have the means to discuss those plans and create their own community input and feedback. Indeed, they can set about identifying and listing their own unique development needs, rather than leave it to econocratic experts in New York and London. Freenets have allowed communities in the U.S. to revive declining civic culture and resist the intrustions of outside corporations seeking to override their will in the siting of toxic industries. In the developing world, they could help empower communities to respond to the onslaught of blind development for development's sake.
Infotech means that development does not have to be carried out as before. Since it does not stop at national boundaries, it changes the locus of action in development from the nation-state to transnational NGOs. Such NGOs, while often operating from a centralized headquarters, can now communicationally link numerous centres in various parts of the developing world, each helping to monitor the unique environmental, economic, cultural, and political factors present in that area. This has made NGOs vital actors in the global scene, and active participants in world meetings such as the UN Earth Summit in Rio, Brazil. Since NGOs to a certain extent are free from some of the traditional limitations of both governments and private industries, they can work to create a new kind of humane development that looks beyond private profit or bureaucratic timetables. And this is in part made possible by information technology.
Regional economic and informational cooperation also becomes facilitated by information technology. Developing nations are able to share knowledge and issues on their own terms, without having to do it at a developed-world conference. But, of course, the same technology can always be double-edged. "Info-capitalism" has made possible the rapid speculation on exchange of world currency and the extreme liquidity of global capital, making developing nations very vulnerable to sudden economic shifts. Multinational corporations have set up their own proprietary information networks, effectively cutting off anyone outside their corporate 'loop' from accessing or viewing their trade secrets. New forms of economic sabotage ('info-warfare') are possible in electronically-based economies, ranging from the release of computer viruses to disinformation. The developing world will have to be cautious in putting all its eggs in the infotech basket.
Another problem will lie in the area of intellectual property. Certainly, the Third World can benefit from information technology to help staunch the "brain drain" of losing talented scientists and intellectuals to universities in the First World. Infotech can help them promote their own scientific societies and research structures. But the problem lies in that the vast majority of scientific databases still remain in Western countries under various forms of proprietary control. Knowledge that should belong to Third World indigenous people about medicinal plants becomes patented in the U.S. Because of U.S. intellectual property law, the Third World can ride the information highway, but it has to pay extremely high tolls. It is for this reason that hacking and piracy have become so endemic in the Third World, and that so much of the argument around GATT has involved intellectual property issues. Infotech in the Third World will make the problem get worse because people will begin demanding back the data that should already belong to them (such as satellite maps of the location of natural resources.)
The third problem has already been touched upon: dependency. When the U.S. or the U.N. has attempted technology transfer of infotech to the Third World, as with other projects, there has often been no attempt to systematically train people who will train others to use the technology. Thus, there is a constant reliance on the foreign experts to train people how to use it. Ironically, the dilemma with infotech is the one of finding a flashlight in the dark. The technology allows people to locate information about how to use the technology (the Internet is the best source of data about how to use the Internet), but of course they've got to be able to use it first in order to figure out how to use it... so it merely produces frustration and dependency in developing societies. Multinational corporations who often use such systems for maintaining data in the Third World rarely assist those countries with technical assistance, except perhaps to charge unusually high consulting fees.
Thus, world communication has basically become a monologue rather than a dialogue. The Third World is unable to represent itself, either through prose or through representations in other media (film, music, etc.) Instead, it finds a distorted and ethnocentric representation of itself, in the constant bombardment of electronic media it receives from the First World. In response, Third World scholars have sought to emphasize the "right to communicate" as a fundamental human right, as fundamental as any other principle enumerated in the U.N. Declaration of Human Rights. These scholars have sought to suggest that the communication rights enjoyed in the Western countries (freedom of association, freedom of the press, freedom of expression) are made impossible in the Third World, both by government censorship and restriction and lack of access to communications production technology. The Third World doesn't just need TV sets, newswires, and radio receivers, it needs TV production facilities, local news networks, and radio transmitters. Unfortunately, the cost of these things often means that the only entity who can afford to own and operate them is the national government.
Already, many ironies in the realm of infotech have begun to appear. Many Third World countries have "home pages" on the World Wide Web which describe information about their people and culture. However, the designers of these pages have often been multinational travel agencies, and they have often focused exclusively only on things like ecotourism and investment. The model of the Infobahn that some people have considered would be more like a broadcast model than a network model - it would be vertically integrated, with multimedia content services being dispersed from a central point. However, under this model the Third World would simply be a passive recipient of information, rather than an active participant in the conversation of development. The Infobahn has to improve horizontal integration, the ability of people in the Third World to share information with each other in a decentralized way, if it is to be of any use at all in rural development. The Third World has to be allowed to produce its own informational content and have informational autonomy, rather than just receiving prepackaged media from the First World.