{"id":4400,"date":"2026-09-26T16:57:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-26T11:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/?page_id=4400"},"modified":"2026-10-08T11:58:16","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T06:28:16","slug":"note-from-directors-2025-26","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/note-from-directors-2025-26\/","title":{"rendered":"Note From The Directors 2025-26"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\tA Note From The Directors\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>
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IT for Change marked its Silver Jubilee on July 19, 2025\u2014a momentous milestone for us; a journey not only in organization-building but in co-shaping what is seen today as the field of digital justice.<\/span><\/p>\n

We commemorated the organizational landmark with a befitting convening, <\/span>Our Digital Futures Fest<\/span><\/i>. A coming together of community and conviction, the series of events at the fest was about looking back with thankfulness, so we can look to the future with hope and resolve. Our peers and mentors were there with our wonderful founding team members and precious families. We recommitted ourselves to the solidarities that have brought us this far and opened our hearts to new generations of thought and thought leaders.<\/span><\/p>\n

When we started out in 2000, we were one of the few critical voices in what was an emergent half-idea\u2014information and communications technologies for development (ICTD). A mouthful to describe experiments that would\u2014in two decades\u2014spawn multidisciplinary specializations. The exuberance in the early 2000s was palpable. The internet (spelt then with a capital I) seemed like magic, which it undoubtedly was. Pundits predicted a revolution\u2014a future of plenty, where markets, governance, knowledge systems, societal exchange, all were poised for upheaval. In a world where neoliberal globalization would eventually meet \u2018Californian ideology\u2019 (a curious mix of market economics and the freedoms of hippie artisanship that transmutated into the familiar Big Tech we know today), the arc of digital innovation became the new toy, a weapon for 21<\/span>st<\/span>-century political economy. Freedom, community, sharing, and self-expression were getting a makeover that the early unicorns were brokering through the platform economy.<\/span><\/p>\n

Today, as we witness an internet dream gone wrong, it is clear that footloose digital capitalism has taken over our materiality and our imagination. For those dressed in Wall Street suits (as Saskia Sassen famously wrote), the frictionless takeover of the globe presents a predatory opportunity. Big Tech is truly smart; it knows how exactly to extract its pound of flesh, striking a bargain with the state to remain unshackled. Today\u2019s AI-led economy lacks baselines for human rights and justice. Its value chains are a measure of neo-colonial extraction \u2014 the relentless datafication of bodies, labor, knowledge and lifeworlds. We sit at a turn where \u2018agentic AI\u2019 is on offer\u2014the sell is so loud that our cognitive surrender is near-complete even as the usurpation of our social-intellectual commons, complete. The Big Tech-Big Brother complex seems to be tomorrow\u2019s totalizing political order.<\/span><\/p>\n

For IT for Change, this shifting terrain has meant that our mission and action towards digital justice is no longer fringe. It is at the center of a global crisis of publicness and democracy that our impact and influence in the domain must address. From food security to climate, work and leisure, industrial policy, and global diplomacy, a loss of political directionality is already proving to be costly; people and planet are pushed to the brink. The question for our path ahead is rather straightforward\u2014how do we shape the practice and politics of the digital transition for equity and human flourishing? Simple question, with no easy answers. But there is power in the company you keep. What we are learning from our allies\u2014social movements, worker cooperatives, young feminists, technologists, and local governments, is that another digital world is possible, and it cannot be left to the oligarchy.
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As a forerunner in the field, we can say with pride that our contributions have been ahead of the curve.<\/span><\/p>\n

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  • We have built conceptual heuristics that today are part of the field\u2019s commonsense: \u2018digital justice\u2019, \u2018the intelligence corporation\u2019, \u2018feminist data solidarity\u2019, \u2018substantive equality in AI governance\u2019, \u2018collective data sovereignty\u2019, \u2018platformizing workplaces\u2019, \u2018regenerative AI\u2019, \u2018critical EdTech\u2019, to name a few. <\/span>
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  • We are recognized and respected as an ecosystem builder\u2014connecting the dots and building unfamiliar solidarity architectures for discovery, encounter, and creativity.<\/span>
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  • We have grown to become a port of call for civil society organizations and the policy community in India and the Global South, a trustworthy voice, a people\u2019s representative that UN agencies and political blocs like the BRICS, G20 and OECD turn to. <\/span>
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  • We have made our mark as one of those rare organizations able to straddle discourse and practice. Our public EdTech models, community- and school-based digital media hubs for girls, tech design for women worker platforms, and nascent experiments in building AI prototypes help us walk the high talk\u2014bridging concepts with the necessary reality, sharpening our analysis and policy prescriptions.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

    So, where to from here?<\/span><\/p>\n

    This year, we created the time and space to also take a pause and reflect on our organizational mission and strategy, deliberating upon the uncertainties of the external context. We talked about the approaches that would keep us relevant, and the internal readiness needed for the years to come. The mission of digital justice has to be defined and pursued anew constantly by being ever-alive to the shifting winds of change. We do not know what lies on the horizon beyond generative AI\u2014there\u2019s no crystal ball for that. But our cookbook has stood the test of time \u2013 new tech might come and go, but there is no way other than to question runaway power, envision alternatives, build and sustain solidarities, and be seen and recognized for the ethos we wear proudly.<\/span><\/p>\n

    We are grateful to all those who have accompanied us on this journey, reposing trust and confidence in our capability. Across generations, our team members have shown what shifting the status quo means, and demonstrated how social sector organizations must hold themselves to the yardstick of public purpose. We continue on this path with optimism and self-reflexivity, cautious that we stay on course\u2014and going back to Audre Lorde\u2019s haunting question (which we paraphrase)\u2014not becoming somebody else on the way to ourselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

    With gratitude and hope,<\/span><\/p>\n

    Directors<\/span><\/p>\n

    IT for Change<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>

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    A Note From The Directors IT for Change marked its Silver Jubilee on July 19, 2025\u2014a momentous milestone for us; a journey not only in organization-building but in co-shaping what is seen today as the field of digital justice. We commemorated the organizational landmark with a befitting convening, Our Digital Futures Fest. A coming together […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4400","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4400"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4400\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5002,"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4400\/revisions\/5002"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/annual-reports.itforchange.net\/reports\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}