The GRACE Network aimed to empower women through information and communication technologies. It supported 21 research teams across 14 countries between 2004-2014. The network encouraged teams to follow their passions and choose their own research topics related to women's empowerment and ICT. Teams received mentorship and engaged in dialogues to develop critical thinking. The network ultimately produced a book highlighting how women used ICT to enhance self-awareness, develop critical voices, and transform personal and social relationships. Factors like the focus on intentional purpose and relationality helped nurture participants' agency and voice.

1. Voice, Agency and Intentional Purpose:
Reflections on Impact and Process of the GRACE
Network
Presentation for the Webinar:
“Looking for a gender perspective in ICT4D”
Organised by ONG 2.0 and CCM – Comitato Collaborazione Medica
9 April 2015
Ineke Buskens
GRACE Network
Leader
Research for the
Future

2. Introduction to the GRACE Network
Gender Research in Africa and the Middle East into
Information Communication Technology for Empowerment:
Currently 21 research teams in 14 countries. Support team
in South Africa and Canada. Period 2004 – 2014
Origin:
United Nations 2003 call for Voices of women from the
Global South, especially from Africa, in relation to the
Information Society.
Initiated and funded by the International Development
Research Centre (ACACIA Programme, Heloise Emdon)
and supported by the Association for Progressive
Communication (Jennifer Radloff and Anriette
Esterhuyzen).

3. Purposes and Intentionalities
• General GRACE Purpose: Women’s Empowerment through, in
and with ICT, taking into account the internal and external
factors that either support or challenge their empowerment
efforts (2005).
• Background vision (True North) of a world where all people
are free.
• Regional Purpose:
– For the Africa group (2005): ‘Giving Africa its dignity back’
– For the MENA group (2008): ‘Improving the position of
women in the region’.
• Project Specific Purposes for the various teams.
• Individual intentions pertaining to personal aspirations.

4. Understanding of Development
Development is grounded in the intention and the
undertaking of efforts of people to create the life that
they have reason to value.
This means that the involved parties need to:
understand the external factors as well as the
internal factors that either inhibit or encourage
intentions and efforts to this end;
enhance awareness of such factors and support
intentions and efforts for personal change and social
transformation.

5. Approach: Voice, Agency and
Intentional Purpose
• Every team was encouraged to follow their passion
and had the freedom to choose their own research
purpose and question, discourses, definitions,
research methods and techniques and respondent
group.
• The purpose aligned research designs required the
development of meta theoretical capacity.
• Ongoing suggested reading: gender and feminist
literature, ICT4D and project specific theory.
• Intense annual teaching and learning workshops
• Ongoing virtual and physical mentorship.
• Intensive mediation of dialogues on our mail lists.
• Writing: morning pages, reports and book chapters
(2 books)

6. Impact Proxy:
Women and ICT in Africa and the
Middle East:
Changing Selves, Changing Societies
• Part One: Agentic ICT Use: The Aspiration
For Emancipation Versus The Power Of
Gender Traditions
• Part Two: Developing Critical Voice In And
Through Safe ICT- Created Space
• Part Three: ICT- Enhanced Relating And
Becoming: Personal And Social
Transformation

7. Part One: Agentic ICT Use: The Aspiration For Emancipation Versus
The Power Of Gender Traditions
1. Healthy Women, Healthy Society: ICT And The Need For
Women’s Empowerment In Yemen
2. Computer Proficiency And Women’s Empowerment:
Gendered Experiences Of ICT At The University Of
Khartoum |
3. Towards Non-Gendered ICT Education: The Hidden
Curriculum At The National University Of Science And
Technology In Zimbabwe
4. Equal Opportunities On An Unequal Playing Field: The
Potential For Social Change In The ICT Workplace
5. Can New Practice Change Old Habits? ICT And Female
Politicians’ Decision-Making In Senegal
6. Personal Expansion Versus Traditional Gender
Stereotypes: Tunisian University Women And ICT
7. Hiba’s Quest For Freedom: ICT And Gender- Based
Violence In Yemen

8. Part Two: Developing Critical Voice In And
Through Safe ICT- Created Space
8 ICT In A Time Of Sectarian Violence: Reflections From
Kafanchan, Northern Nigeria
9Disconnecting From And In The Public Sphere, Connecting
Online: Young Egyptian Women Expand Their Self-Knowing
Beyond Cultural And Body-Image Dictates
10Teenage Girls’ Sexting In Cape Town, South Africa: A Child-
Centred And Feminist Approach
11Of Browsing And Becoming: Young Yemeni Women Enhance
Their Self-Awareness And Leadership Capacities
12ICT In The Search For Gender Freedoms: Jordanian
University Students Think, Talk And Change
13Scheherazades Of Today: Young Palestinian Women Use
Technology To Speak Up And Effect Change
14 Jordanian Bloggers: A Journey Of Speaking Back To The
Politics Of Silence, Shame And Fear
8

9. Part Three: ICT- Enhanced Relating And Becoming:
Personal And Social Transformation
16 Ancient Culture And New Technology: ICT And A Future
Free From FGM/C For Girls In Sudan
17 Finding New Meaning, Creating New Connections: ICT
Empowers Mothers Of Children With Special Needs In Egypt
18 Serving Self And Society: Female Radio Presenters In
Uganda Effect Social Change
19 Challenging The Silence, Secrecy And Shame: Transforming
ICT’s Role In Increasing Pre-Marital Sex In Sudan
20 Reviving The Power Of Community: How Radio Rurale
Femme De Mbalmayo In Cameroon Became A Catalyst For
Equality And Democracy
21 Transforming Relationships And Co-Creating New Realities:
Landownership, Gender And ICT In Egypt

10. Factors Facilitating Integration and
Impact
The focus on intentional purpose in all aspects of
the preparation and the actual work nurtured
participants’ capacity for agency; not only their
critical agency but also their creative agency.
The focus on relationality in all aspects of the
preparation and the work stimulated participants’
capacity for voice; not only their critical voice
but also their capacity for critical dialogue.
GRACE as a living membrane, held and supported
all of us, regardless what we went through.

11. What I learnt: Respect ……
• For women’s rationalities….. especially
when we do not understand them
• For power, power differentials and power
relationships from the global scene to the
household, from the self geo-politically
• For ourselves, our journeys of learning
and growing insight and our care

12. Acknowledgements and contact details
All our research participants, the organizations
and institutions that facilitated access to our
research participants and funded us (especially
the International Research Development Centre
(IDRC)
Serena Carta of ONG2.0
Contact Details:
GRACE: grace-network.net
Ineke Buskens: ineke@researchforthefuture.com