The gender digital divide is insidious in that it works in a cycle in which gender-insensitive policy-making is processes and instruments design and deploy policies and initiatives purported to address women’s digital marginalization but which invariably tends to reinforce the problem rather than eliminate it. A strategic way to address the problem is to break the cycle by inserting the voice and agency of women in the policy-making process and engender the policy instrument. It was in order to contribute to deconstructing the patriarchal inscribed cycle that the Centre for Information Technology and
Development (CITAD) with support from the Association for
Progressive Communications (APC) initiated the
Developing Digital Policy Leadership Among Young Women
project. We prefer to refer to it as initiative rather than the
usual implementation because we do not believe that a
pilot project like this would in the short implementation
period of just three months address the challenge of the
digital marginalization of women. Rather, it is supposed to
seed a process in building a movement of knowledge and
capable women and activities and cultivate their voice and
agency in a sustained advocacy to bridge the gender digital
divide and as well generally support digital inclusion in all its
ramifications.
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