In Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA), artificial intelligence is still in its early stages of adoption. To ensure that the already existing class imbalance in SSA communities does not hinder the realization of the Sustainable Development Goals, such as data security, safety, and equitable access to AI technologies, acceptable reliability measures must be put in place (as policies). This paper identifies some of the vulnerabilities in AI and adds a voice to the risks and ethical concerns surrounding the use of AI and its impact on SSA and its vulnerable groups. Our systematic literature review of related research between January 2014 and June 2024 shows the current state of AI adoption in SSA and the socio-political challenges that impact its development, revealing key concerns in data Governance, safety privacy, educational and skill gaps, socioeconomic impacts, and stakeholder influence on AI adoption in SSA. We propose a framework for designing data governance policies for the inclusive use of AI in SSA.
Category: Hard Questions: Society
-
The missing voices at AI conferences
Policymaking should be a society-wide effort, including elected officials, government employees, academics, business leaders, civil society groups and individuals. In theory, each of us should be able to participate.
-
Do They Really Care about Us? On the Limits of State Intervention
This paper examines the limits of state intervention through the relationship between freedom and equality, the rule of law and social justice, as well as through two highly contradictory concepts regarding the scope of government action – the concepts of minimal state and paternalistic state. Accordingly, we seek to identify a model capable of outlining the extent to which the state can intervene in the light of socially beneficial goals, but without compromising individual freedom. Since we cannot find such a model within the extreme positions of liberalism and socialism, this paper seeks to offer a satisfactory solution by mitigating some of the ideologically exclusive positions. It embraces Aristotle’s teaching about the middle as a virtue and proposes sophisticated neoliberalism as a potential alternative to the status quo. Still, as insisted, the government should never be allowed to assume uncontrollable powers and create conditions for collectivist doctrines that recognize no individual freedom.
-
Several presentations, including “Taking the Lead in SWE: An Asian Perspective.”
Dr. Bhaduri will be presenting at the Society of Women Engineers, with whom she is a Senator. Several events are online for interested persons. Dr. Bhaduri is an accomplished technologist and educator, as well as being excellent speaker and is appreciated for her wit, her precision, and her kindness.
-
Does “Fortress Europe” have an alternative? EU member states between solidarity and national interests
This paper examines the repercussions of the 2015 European migrant/refugee crisis, which culminated with the 2018 dispute between Italy and France. It is concerned with the Dublin Regulation and the New Pact on Asylum and Migration, which are critical to the division and consequent polarizations across the EU. The Member States’ failure to show solidarity and agree to share the burden in relation to the distribution of immigrants and asylum seekers has brought the European integrationist project into question. In addition to considering the general theoretical explanations, the paper also looks into the African-origin migration/displacement as a proper trigger of widespread disagreements among European governments. The deliberate and systematic impoverishment of the local inhabitants – largely through the use of the French Treasurytied Communauté Financière Africaine (CFA) franc – exposes the neo-colonial nature of the current practices and thus jeopardizes all those discourses and policy initiatives focused on the provision of peace and stability.
-
Digital Surveillance in Southern Africa
Surveillance practices are increasingly becoming dynamic and pervasive, spurred on by the ever-mutating changes in technological inventions at a global level. The practice of surveillance has become embedded in our everyday digital communications, public spaces, workplaces, cross-border movements, financial transactions, logging transactions and many other spaces on which citizens interact. What makes the case of southern African region unique is not only the increasing pervasiveness of surveillance, but the acute lack of transparency in the practice, the absence of necessary and proportionate regulations and the politicized nature of surveillance in the region. This is worrisome in a region where constitutionalism is sluggish, democracy is decline and (semi) authoritarian tendencies are becoming more entrenched.
-
Global environmental health impacts of rare earth metals: Insights for research and policy making in Africa
The rise of globalization and industrialization has driven the demand for rare earth metals (REMs). These metals are widely used in various sectors of the global economy with various applications in medicine, renewable energy, electronics, agriculture, and the military. REMs are likely to remain an important part of our global future, and, as production increases, areas contaminated by REMs are expected to expand over the coming decades. Thus, triggering significant adverse environmental, animal, and human health impacts. Despite increased attention on REMs outside China in recent years, there are limited studies exploring REM production, deposits, and associated health impacts in the African context. Proper mine management, adequate safety protocols, sustainable processing methods, and waste handling systems have been identified and proposed globally; however, the nature and scale of implementing these management protocols on the African continent have been less clear. Therefore, planetary health-centered solutions are urgently needed to be undertaken by researchers, policy makers, and non-governmental actors in Africa and across the globe. This is with the overarching aim of ensuring eco-friendly alternatives and public health consciousness on REM exploitations and hazards for future generations to come.
-
Diving into data: Pitfalls and promises of data journalism in semi-authoritarian contexts
This paper calls for greater scrutiny of data journalism as a practice in the semi authoritarian context of Zimbabwe. Based on in-depth interviews with practising journalists in Zimbabwe, this paper answers two main questions: In what ways is data journalism practised in the Zimbabwean context? To what extent are newsrooms in Zimbabwe “tooled” and capacitated for data journalism practices? We note that data journalism is widely understood by individual journalists in this country but paradoxically less practised due to many challenges. By answering these two questions, we sustain an argument that data journalism appropriation in semi-authoritarian contexts can be instrumental in promoting monitorial democracy and reversing media decadence.
-
Leveraging responsible, explainable, and local artificial intelligence solutions for clinical public health in the Global South
In the present paper, we will explore how artificial intelligence (AI) and big data analytics (BDA) can help address clinical public and global health needs in the Global South, leveraging and capitalizing on our experience with the “Africa-Canada Artificial Intelligence and Data Innovation Consortium” (ACADIC) Project in the Global South, and focusing on the ethical and regulatory challenges we had to face. “Clinical public health” can be defined as an interdisciplinary field, at the intersection of clinical medicine and public health, whilst “clinical global health” is the practice of clinical public health with a special focus on health issue management in resource-limited settings and contexts, including the Global South. As such, clinical public and global health represent vital approaches, instrumental in (i) applying a community/population perspective to clinical practice as well as a clinical lens to community/population health, (ii) identifying health needs both at the individual and community/population levels, (iii) systematically addressing the determinants of health, including the social and structural ones, (iv) reaching the goals of population’s health and well-being, especially of socially vulnerable, underserved communities, (v) better coordinating and integrating the delivery of healthcare provisions, (vi) strengthening health promotion, health protection, and health equity, and (vii) closing gender inequality and other (ethnic and socio-economic) disparities and gaps. Clinical public and global health are called to respond to the more pressing healthcare needs and challenges of our contemporary society, for which AI and BDA can help unlock new options and perspectives. In the aftermath of the still ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the future trend of AI and BDA in the healthcare field will be devoted to building a more healthy, resilient society, able to face several challenges arising from globally networked hyper-risks, including ageing, multimorbidity, chronic disease accumulation, and climate change.
-
The militarization of digital surveillance in post-coup Zimbabwe:‘Just don’t tell them what we do’
While a large body of research has documented and theorized digital surveillance practices in various political contexts, little has been done to investigate the growing trend of military-driven digital surveillance practices in semi-authoritarian regimes. In this article, I use the case of the surveillance practices of the Zimbabwe Defence Forces to argue that scholarship needs to (re)evaluate this emerging trend. The article has three aims: first, it explores military-driven surveillance capabilities, the circulation of such capabilities and the surveillance tactics emerging in the semi-authoritarian context of Zimbabwe. Second, it examines the interface of factionalism and politics within the Zimbabwe Defence Forces and how this influences quotidian military-driven digital surveillance practices.
-
Powers, Interests and Actors 1: The Influence of China in Africa’s Digital Surveillance Practices
This chapter examines the influence of China in the growth of Africa’s digital surveillance 1 capabilities and practices. The growth of Chinese investments through its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in the global south is well documented. Yet, China’s digital infrastructure investments in Africa still present a research lacuna that needs to be filled. Equally under-researched is how it influences African governments’ clampdown on citizens. Utilising the international political economy approach, we analyse the intersection of power, actors and interests in Africa’s surveillance practices focusing on Zambia and Zimbabwe. We focus on Zimbabwe and Zambia because their ties with China are among the most enduring of all African countries.
-
Hate speech and polarization in participatory society, 67-82
Since the advent of Twitter in 2006, South Africa has witnessed a spectacular explosion of racist discourse on social media platforms. According to the South Africa Human Rights Commission (SAHRC, 2016), the centres of explosive racist discourses are Twitter and Facebook. SAHRC (2016) further notes that recent racist outbursts on Twitter and Facebook threaten the creation of a non-racial society and general social cohesion in South Africa. The surge of racist rants in South Africa reflects a society that is increasingly becoming racially polarised (South African Institute of Race Relations, 2018). The SAHRC trend analysis report (2016) reveals that discrimination on the grounds of race remains the highest of equality complaints, with an annual increase in high-profile derogatory incidences frequently aimed at black Africans. Similarly, Daniels (2009), Rauch and Schantz (2013) and Shepherd et al.(2015) note that social media have become a major conveyer of hate crimes against racial minorities and a major reason for the failure of multiculturalism as an institutional practice at a global level. Social media discussions on the subject of race in South Africa have served to highlight how racism remains pervasive and toxic (SAHRC, 2016). Some studies, such as those by Mafoko (2017) and Stephens (2018), have argued that the ‘rainbow nation’that the first democratically elected president of the country, Nelson Mandela, envisaged is now history–not a lived reality.