Using ICT to Help the Poor Access Public Services: an action research programme

Abstract

The proposition that provision of some form of ICT could assist the population of the urban slums of developing countries to obtain the access to public services to which they are entitled is being widely tested through experimentation. The particular programme of experiments in Croatia, India, Nigeria and Pakistan described here was funded by the UK Department of International Development as participatory action research. The Indian project is dealt with in most detail. It took a poorly used hospital specializing in maternal and child health care in New Delhi and supplied a community-based voice connection for use by potential patients. Use of the hospital increased, relations between community and the hospital improved, inadequacies in the hospital services were addressed and a vision of what the hospital might achieve in the future began to emerge. The mechanisms by which this was achieved are examined, and some generally applicable conclusions drawn.