Full Circle Associates

First, full disclosure: I led the guest editorial board for this edition of the Knowledge Management for Development Journal, so I'm biased! ;-) And I suggested the theme. Nonetheless I'm thrilled to see this baby hit the web with 12 pieces that showcase how people have picked, deployed and supported interaction processes with technology in international development. Vol 3, No 1 (2007)

The editorial, penned by Bev Trayner and I, gives a bit of a wrapper to the volume. Here is the first part:

This edition of the Knowledge Management for Development Journal explores how international development practitioners find new ways to work together using Internet technologies. The lens used in all the articles foregrounds human processes; technologies take a complementary and interdependent role. In the framing of this space between design and deployment of tools, we pay attention to both technology and social practices that groups and communities use in their application of technologies to their work.

This practice of working the relationship between technology and social practices is called ‘technology stewardship’. In the forthcoming book Technologies for Communities of Practice (working title), Etienne Wenger, Nancy White and John Smith describe technology stewarding as a way of adopting ‘a community’s perspective to help a community choose, configure, and use technologies to best suit its needs.’ In paying attention to a community’s perspective on its choice of technologies ‘stewarding attends both to what happens spontaneously and what can happen purposefully, by plan and by cultivation of insights into what actually works.’

Through stewarding, specific technological expertise is provided to a community, based on its particular needs. This could be anywhere along its life, from initial to mature states. It can be a critical part of community development, facilitating the emergence or growth of a community, for instance when a tool allows people to connect for the first time (Wenger et al., forthcoming).

The potential of technology stewardship in international development is limited only by our imaginations. Theoretically, technology allows people not just to acquire information, but to produce and share it. It enables people to work across organizational, geographic and national boundaries. It facilitates connections between people who can share knowledge and create meaning and understanding together. But to fulfill these possibilities, we need to learn how to build bridges between the technology and our human needs.

In a development context, such bridging involves a set of specific challenges, not only in terms of technology deployment: dealing with diverse access to technology and
infrastructures, fostering collaboration between different cultures, languages and
discourses. In this context, the technology steward serves the community, attentive to the cultural biases and power relationships that are embedded in the tools and the practice.

Such a task is challenging. Technology stewardship is rarely the role of one person, but rather is fulfilled by several people within communities. As such, the art of technology stewardship is both a technological and a process one, fostering technologies for communities that allow people to work together across time and distance.

In the articles included in this issue, the specific issue of technology stewardship is explored, in different contexts. In many of the contributions, technology stewardship is implicit, and the term is rarely used explicitly. Nonetheless, the practice is described in every article.

For me, the value of this edition is in making the practice of community technology stewardship visible and discussable. The term "technology stewardship" may be nothing to write home to mamma about, but it gives us a handle into a discussion about an important practice so many of us are running in to. So I invite you to take a peek. Here is the Table of Contents!

Editorial

Editorial: Stewarding technologies for collaboration, community building and knowledge sharing in development	Abstract PDF
Nancy White, Beth Kanter, Partha Sarker, Oreoluwa Somolu, Beverly Trayner, Brenda Zulu, Lucie Lamoureux	2-4

Articles

Users and tools: the art of matchmaking. Challenges in choosing appropriate online collaboration tools for development professionals and practitioners	Abstract PDF
Vic Klabbers, Nynke Kruiderink	5-25

Limitations of knowledge sharing in academia. A case from Nigeria	Abstract PDF
Oluwaseyitanfunmi Osunade, Foluso Phillips Oluwaseun, Ojo Oluwasesin	26-34

The personal research portal: web 2.0 driven individual commitment with open access for development	Abstract PDF
Ismael Peña-López	35-48

Case Studies

Development through Dialogue. A showcase of Dgroups from three perspectives; institutional, project and capacity development level	Abstract PDF
Titi Akinsamni, Andrea Aranguren, Manju Chatani, Nynke Kruiderink, Theresa Stanton	49-67

Using ICTs for knowledge sharing and collaboration: an international experience based on Bellanet’s work in the South	Abstract PDF
Margarita Salas Guzmán	68-78

Web2.0 supported rural communities: a case study from Portugal	Abstract PDF
Josien Kapma	79-92

‘Healthcare Information for All by 2015’: a community of purpose facilitated by Reader-Focused Moderation	Abstract PDF
Neil Pakenham-Walsh	93-108

Citizen sourcing in the public interest	Abstract PDF
Lars Hasselblad Torres	134-145

Interviews

Technology stewardship in the face of a crisis. An interview with Dina Mehta	Abstract PDF
Beth Kanter, Nancy White	109-114

Stories

Using a dgroup with third party online applications for a cause	Abstract PDF
Giacomo Rambaldi	115-125

A stealth transformation: introducing wikis to the UN	Abstract PDF
Anna Maron, Mikel Maron	126-130

Community Notes

Community Notes. Blogs: lessons from a rookie	Abstract PDF
Michelle Laurie	131-133