ict4peace: beyond crisis mapping

Sanjana Hattotuwa

TED FellowSenior Advisor, ICT4Peace Foundation

sri lanka

systemic problems

• Systemic violence still present two years after end of war

• Critical dissent still not tolerated. Self-censorship of MSM high.

• No real reconciliation. No real political settlement for legitimate grievances.

• Legacy of 30 years of war: Communal distrust, continued militarisation, national security mindset, repressive government, poor rule of law, democratic deficit

• Not those easily visible or explained

my work

one text peace negotiations platform2003 - 2004

monitoring election violencehttp://cmev.wordpress.com | Covered every election since 2008

human rights monitoringScreenshot of first system ~2007

mainstream media monitoringhttp://www.cpalanka.org/mediamonitoring | From the late 90’s

• Recording how language frames bias and reporting

helping rural communities leverage new mediahttp://ict4peace.wordpress.com/2009/07/29/from-community-radio-to-internet-radio-mobiles-and-narrow-casting-new-models-for-enduring-needs

groundviews: citizen journalism redefining media

groundviews: citizen journalism redefining media

• Over 6 million words of original content - articles plus commentary, photos and video not included

• Special edition a year after the end of war resulted in book

• Covered stories and issues not a single other media has during and after war on IDPs, war crimes, democratic deficit, corruption, election violence

• First to introduce satire and poetry and

• First to launch YouTube Video channel, Twitter account, curated Twitter feeds, Facebook fan page, mobile friendly site

• First to use web visualisations, Google Maps, Google Moderator

• First to introduce long form journalism in Sri Lanka

groundviews: first civility code2006

bearing witness: not regime change

• Curation, participation, collaboration

• Use of mobile technologies

• Leveraging text, photos, videos, cartoons, satire, animation, visualisation

• Change rare, richer narratives, fuller history

Online security: posters and trainingUnder the radar for key HR and media freedom defenders for 3+ years

recording history: archiving vital websiteshttp://sitesatrisksl.wordpress.com

ict4peacewriting on technology for peace and democracy since 2006

ict4peacewriting on disasters and tech since Boxing Day tsunami, 2004

http://sites.google.com/site/sanjanah/thoughtsonictandpeacebuilding

http://sites.google.com/site/sanjanah/articlesandpublications

ict4peace foundationcrisis information wikis

ict4peace foundationcrisis information wikis

• Wikis created in 2010 for Haiti earthquake, Chile earthquake, Gulf Oil Spill, Kyrgyzstan humanitarian crisis, Pakistan floods

• In March 2011, at the request of Standby Volunteer Task Force, wiki created for Libya Uprising.

• In general all the wikis contain,

• Comprehensive curated list of crisis information

• UN OCHA situation reports, comprehensive briefing kits from Reliefweb, ETC sit reps and other vital information

• Key background documents

• Curated links to Twitter feeds, Facebook groups, Flickr photos and other social media sites

• Comprehensive list of mapping resources from Google and other sources

• Google Translate based translations of key vernacular resources including media

• Converting Office 2011 docs to Google Docs (e.g. 3W information)

challenges for crisis mappingfrom bitter experience

• How does information visualisation really contribute to a stronger democracy?

• Do telegenics of recent revolutions take into account systemic violence? Do technologies that underpin revolutions endure?

• Open standards still lacking - collaboration is not the same as information exchange

• Context, content, creator and consumer dynamics absent from most crowd sourcing discussions. How to integrate into global volunteer base?

• Lessons from Pakistan flooding - some disasters are sexier than others

• Denouement of war in Sri Lanka was without witness - can crisis mapping help bear witness (a process) as opposed to mapping (which is event based)

• Failing forward still absent - everyone has success stories, everyone is saving the world a map at a time

• Ground realities like PTSD, fear, anxiety, censorship that affect ICTs in war time and post-war peacebuilding still under studied

thank you

sanjanahattotuwa@ict4peace.org