The World Bank is launching its new web initiative tomorrow.
Read the declaration, and -- if you agree -- please follow the instructions, sign and forward...
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Knowledge is power.
The World Bank's Development Gateway is a way of centralising and entrenching their power.
Don't let them.
PLEASE CIRCULATE AND SIGN THE DECLARATION BELOW.
The declaration below has been written and endorsed by a spectrum of 'knowledge workers' - an unlovely term for people who research or discuss development issues in the media, in education and in other areas - who are deeply concerned with the implications of the Bank's new internet project.
This declaration is unlike previous petitions against the Bank's initiative. There is no attempt to lobby the World Bank or alter the Gateway's structure or content. Previous such attempts have resulted in only marginal or cosmetic changes. Rather, this letter encourages people not to contribute to or use this Bank-backed scheme. The signatories of this letter have pledged to avoid any contact with the Bank's development gateway, and to push forward with their own diverse research and publication agendas, including independent internet schemes.
This is a declaration that can be signed by anyone. Please mention any institutional affiliation when you sign -- which will be for informational and identification purposes and won't imply the endorsement of your organisation. Send a message to gateway at voiceoftheturtle.org with your name and organization in the subject line.
Please distribute this call widely to your comrades, colleagues and contacts. If every recipient sends it to at least five people or lists, then we can soon achieve a broader coverage than the World Bank's hired PR company. This letter is mirrored at http://www.brettonwoodsproject.org/topic/knowledgebank/gateway/, where a recent Bretton Woods Project briefing on the Gateway is also available.
Raj Patel for The Voice of the Turtle ------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Development Gateway: A Declaration from Concerned Knowledge Workers
Dear friends,
In July the World Bank will launch a multi-million dollar internet-based development knowledge initiative at www.developmentgateway.org. Trumpeted as a place to find diverse perspectives on development, the Bank argues that its Development Gateway will be a convenient tool for civil society groups, officials, journalists and independent researchers. We disagree. On closer scrutiny, the Development Gateway initiative looks less like an attempt to encourage debate than a means to stifle, moderate and control dissenting opinion. We wish to warn colleagues of the perils of associating with or supporting this project.
There are three fundamental objections to the Gateway project. First the gateway privileges certain voices over others. The Gateway does not prioritise poorer people as site contributors, editors or viewers. The Bank's heavy English-language bias exacerbates the dominance of official "development knowledge". You will not find topics on "political economy" or "inequality" or "discrimination", just concepts like "governance" and "human development". Moreover the Gateway's 130-issue taxonomy ghettoises cross-cutting issues such as gender and climate change.
Second, the claim that the site is independent is untenable. This is a clear attempt by the Bank to consolidate itself and its allies as the main authorities on "development knowledge". This is reflected in both the content and process of the Gateway. For instance, in order to provide local content, the Gateway has its own country portals. These will be run by government officials, private business and civil society groups appointed without any clear criteria of representativeness. The content of these gateways will be policed. Within these country gateways, site contributors are told to avoid "country/locale specific events", and not to use metaphors, puns or irony in order "to aid machine translation".
The Bank is appointing individual or institutional "topic guides" to filter and organise material in each of the site's subject areas. The Gateway is supposed to represent all perspectives and all types of analysis. The only reason to exclude items is if they fail to meet the site's "quality" criteria, yet it remains extremely unclear as to how this quality threshold is determined. And given the volume and diversity of information posted on the internet daily, it is unlikely that the guides' coverage will be comprehensive. With the best will in the world, then, the topic guides' selections will be biased in favour of the intellectual tastes of themselves and their contacts.
The third, and most pernicious, effect of the development gateway is to undermine alternatives. Instead of encouraging existing initiatives, the Bank has chosen to centralise internet coverage of development issues in a bid to sift and control the flow of ideas. This is likely to distract from and damage the development of diverse, independent internet sites on these issues.
This is why, in our individual capacities, we pledge to avoid all contact, whether official or otherwise, with the World Bank's Development Gateway. We encourage our colleagues to undertake a similar pledge, and to support alternative sources of knowledge.
Signed (as individuals, organisation names provided for reference only)
Initial signatories:
Yash Tandon, International South Group Network, Zimbabwe Patrick Bond, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa Phil McMichael, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA Chris Brooke, Magdalen College, Oxford, UK Rutendo Kambarami, Communications Officer, Mwelekeo waNGO, Zimbabwe
Further signatories
1.Raj Patel, SEATINI, Zimbabwe 2.Jamal Bouamama assahafa.com Morocco 3.Tony Burdon Oxfam International 4.Glyn Everett, University of Bristol 5.Neil Watkins, Center for Economic Justice, Washington, DC, USA 6.Tristi Tanaka, CorpWatch.org 7.Christina Neall,Surrey BC,CA 8.Debra Oliver, Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA 9.Jon Nissenbaum, Harvard University Dept. of Linguistics 10.Alastair Thompson - Scoop Media - New Zealand 11.Kathleen Williamson, Jubilee NW USA? 12.Sarba Raj Khadka Executive Director Rural Reconstruction Nepal-RRN 13.Deb Lagutaris 14.Camille Chalmers - Haitian Advocacy Platform for an Alternaitve Development (PAPDA) - Haïti 15.Dianne McQuillen ACLU, Amnesty International, Nation Associate and Peace Center 16.Uddhav Raj Bhattarai ActionAid Nepal, Kathmandu 17.Allison Dinsmore, ACT UP Philadelphia 18.Katriona Street ActionAid Nepal. 19.Cosmas Obote, Clare College, Cambridge University 20.Rasigan Maharajh, University of Manchester, UK 21.Richard Worthington Earthlife Africa Jhb, South Africa 22.Nicolas Dieltiens, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa 23.Carina van Rooyen, RAU, South Africa 24.Alex Lopez, International Society for Ecology and Culture, UK 25.Susan George, TNI Network, Netherlands 26.Deborah Stern, School Administrator, United States 27.Alejandrina Pliego 28.Elisa Van Waeyenberge, School of Oriental and African Studies, UK...
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========== Chris Brooke Magdalen College Oxford OX1 4AU
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