Spurred on by the universal female suffrage movement that began in New Zeeland, with its earliest observance on February 28th, 1909 in New York. The first International Women’s Day was marked by over a million people in Austria, Denmark, Germany and Switzerland on 19th, March 1911. This was later picked up by the United Nations which began to celebrate the latter in 1975 a year that had been proclaimed the International Women’s Year. In 1977, the United Nations General Assembly invited member states to proclaim the 8th march as an official UN holiday for women’s rights and world peace, It began to be commemorated annually by the UN and much of the world, with each year’s observance centred on a particular theme or issue within women’s rights.
The digital age is upon us, affecting the way we live and work over the past half-century in a way that the 9 – 5 economies have been replaced with globally integrated 27/7 service offerings. The need to cope with this reality has been handled by different countries differently for the advancements have been terrific in Artificial intelligence, Machine Learning and the Internet of Things. This year’s Women’s Day theme falls in perfectly well. DIGITAL: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality. With all the new possibilities of the digital age also come enormous threats in regard to the digital gender gap, especially on the widening economic and social inequalities exemplified by how women were isolated during the COVID-19 pandemic as most conversations were held online on digital platforms while most rural women had limited or no access to most digital forums.
Humanity has had to deal with universally known transitions which have become a long and circuitous journey, from the Industrial Revolution which brought us to the Industrial Age eventually leading to the Digital Revolution and the current information age. There is a dire need to cultivate maximum levels of boldness from within to transcend the traditional notion of female empowerment which focuses on inapplicable skills or those with low economic value as per the times, to upskilling our young women with 21st-century relevant and in-demand technology skills like cloud computing, software development, data analysis and digital marketing. The challenge is upon us, and we ought to encourage more women to get involved and not see technology as a masculine career/lifestyle.
Fair enough though, there is commendable progress in increased awareness and numerous initiatives, but women still face significant challenges in the sectors that affect all stages of females’ career paths and life courses in the digital sphere. Some of these challenges include but are not limited to unconscious biases, tokenism, low transparency and inclusiveness in business policies. Additionally, to give these a more indigenous context are other specific difficulties that women face when it comes to establishing themselves in the fields of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) i.e. lack of role models, entrenched stereotypes, weaker business networks and stronger perceived difficulties in reconciling business/career and personal life. Given these challenges, there is a need to reflect, rethink and re-orient ourselves towards the realities of the day.
The risk is real and if equality in the digital sphere is not achieved, we will miss talent, vision, resources and wealth. The lack of diversity, particularly of women, in teams developing technology, has an impact on innovation too. Direct evidence of this fact can be found in examples of failed, inadequate or unfortunate products and services. The indirect benefits of having diverse teams are more complex to prove especially for growing economies like Uganda’s, but there is evidence that diversity, particularly in intensively knowledge-based industries such as ICT, increases performance and innovation. If no action is taken, the impact of the lack of diversity in technology can be extreme considering the growing importance of big data and algorithms in our lives that have been preconditioned by the digital age. A study conducted by Iclave for the European Commission dubbed “women in the digital age” highlights with utmost clarity that “technology reflects the values of its developers, and that of the information they draw from” Isn’t it therefore true that allowing for diversity and inclusiveness of teams/communities engaging in digital and information technologies could help identify biases and ultimately prevent them?
Today while we commemorate International Women’s day, let us reflect deeply on what it would take for us to foment women’s interests in tech-related fields/careers. In Africa and Uganda to be exact, policies and initiatives formulated in an effort to advance gender equality in the digital sector should be keen on key moments that have the greatest influence on a woman’s life and these are universally uniform i.e., childhood, adolescence, entering the world of work, motherhood and returning to the labour market.
On such days, we all should remember and acknowledge the strength of a woman in building society juxtaposed with the realities of the day and the projections of the future. I hope this write-up inspires a thought or better even sparks a conversation around the gender gap in I.C.T and how increasing women’s participation in the digital sector can help mitigate gender inequalities, stereotypes and preconceptions, increase access to the labour market for women and improve their working conditions.
From the communications and digital enthusiast’s perspective, we shall close this gap when we get rid of classic stereotypes emanating from patriarchal cultures, foster girl’s education and interest in STEM through tech-based games and lastly provide greater visibility to women who can serve as role models and sources of inspiration for other women and girls.
Elvin John Turibamwe 