1. Why do we need feminist digital economics?
Dr Becky Faith
Digital & Tech Cluster Lead
Engaging, Learning, Transforming

2. Setting the stage New research perspectives/provocations
Based on discussions at APC/IDRC workshop on ‘Mapping the research landscape of gender and digital technology’
Highlighting contribution from broader feminist theory
Distinct from an instrumentalist gendered perspective which focuses on counting
Three themes
Labour
Externalities & the ‘commons’
‘Decolonising’ women and tech
Engaging, Learning, Transforming

3. Setting the stage
Hegemonic discourse in mainstream ICT4D & industry groups like GSMA linking economic advancement for women & use of technology.
“…there is a pressing need for a feminist interrogation of the melding of new technology with personal, social, cultural, economic and political life, and the power structures that are reproduced and redefined in the process”. Jac sm Kee* *
Engaging, Learning, Transforming

4. Setting the stage
Embodied, feminist approaches - approaching digital economy on two levels;
Underlying mechanisms & frameworks (e.g. of information ‘sharing economy’), & materials/resources extracted for this.
Individual level of bodies: people & their agency.
Engaging, Learning, Transforming

5. 1. Labour
Thinking about & quantifying what is constituted as ‘labour’ longstanding feminist concern; e.g. work on unpaid care by Federici (2012), Elson (2015),
In digital contexts; women act as ‘digital housewives’, building & sustaining online relationships, producing & sharing content (Jarrett 2015).
'Cheap female labour is the engine that powers the internet’ (Nakamura 2015).
Engaging, Learning, Transforming

6. 2. Externalities & the ‘commons’
Negative ‘externalities’­­ of digital economy; value chain of digital production and consumption; e.g. e-waste, exploitation in resource extraction, overall environmental impact.
Feminist approaches to the commons: ‘historically and in our time, women have depended more than men on access to communal resources, and have been most committed to their defense’ (Federici 2012: 143).
Also looking at the Internet as a digital commons; ‘global public good’
Feminist Principles of the Internet ask us to challenge ‘the patriarchal spaces and processes that control internet governance’
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7. 3. ‘Decolonising’ women and tech entrepreneurship discourse
Gender pay/employment gaps in tech industry subject to widespread scrutiny because of feminist activism.
Google's tech employees still overwhelmingly white and male (2017 data: 80% men, 53% white).
Current focus on ‘fixing the numbers’ - upskilling women through teaching them to code; where is evidence on long term impact on economic status & employability?
Why not focus on:
Fixing the digital landscape where gender-based violence is endemic?
Building digital economy that respects the agency & privacy of all communities?
Engaging, Learning, Transforming

8. References www.ids.ac.uk Engaging, Learning, Transforming
Federici, S. (2012) Revolution at Point Zero: Housework, Reproduction, and Feminist Struggle, Oakland, CA: PM Press
Jarrett, K. (2015) Feminism, Labour and Digital Media: The Digital Housewife, New York, NY, 10001: Routledge
Nakamura, L. (2015) ‘The Unwanted Labour of Social Media: Women of Colour Call out Culture As Venture Community Management’, New Formations: A Journal of Culture/Theory/Politics 86.1: 106–112
Pearson, R. and Elson, D. (2015) ‘transcending the impact of the financial crisis in the United Kingdom: towards plan F—a feminist economic strategy’, Feminist Review 109.1: 8–30,
Engaging, Learning, Transforming