Internet Decolonized

In Internet Decolonized, Henna Zamurd Butt and M.I. Franklin bring together a collection of cutting-edge essays examining the internet and its governance from a range of decolonial perspectives. Contributors--many from Indigenous communities, World Majority, and Global South regions--unpack the historical, political economic and sociocultural dimensions of internet development as an Anglo-American and western European project.

The authors look at two areas of concern for scholars, policymakers, and social justice advocates: 1) the geopolitics and business of internet technological design and 2) how best to govern the internet as a global communications and information infrastructure. The first considers the landscape of the internet industry and its socio-culturally embedded terms of access and use, and operating standards. The second addresses issues arising from the realm of internet and technology policymaking and regulation, spaces in which industry, governments and civil society representatives come together to set public policy agendas.

Examining diverse approaches to what it means to "decolonize the internet," the book presents real-world cases to bring into focus the vested interests of past, present, and future hi-tech projects, grassroots and community-based alternatives, experiences in human-centered advocacy for internet futures and governance models. Contributors offer insights into longstanding and emerging controversies and research priorities as actors and voices active in shaping the next generation of sustainable and rights-respecting internet policymaking and design.

Henna Zamurd Butt is a scholar-artist and Assistant Professor of Communication & Culture at Columbia College Chicago. She is the founder of Techne Studio, a research space foregrounding feminist and decolonizing approaches to craft and technology. Her scholarship has addressed internet access, community networking, and internet management, combining ethnographic, participatory, and coalitional methods with curatorial and creative inquiry. Practicing with sound, ceramic and print, her creative work is characterized by a deep interest in material dialogue, gestural and ephemeral approaches to making.

M.I. Franklin is Full Professor and Chair Media, Cultural Industries and Society at the University of Groningen. Her research explores the human rights and gender dimensions of online cultures of use and public policymaking from a postcolonial and decolonial perspective. Former Chair of the Global Internet Governance Academic Network (GigaNet) and active as researcher and human rights online advocate since the early 2000's, Franklin also served as co-Chair of the Internet Rights and Principles Dynamic Coalition at the UN Internet Governance Forum. Along with extensive scholarly publications and policy briefs in these domains, she also publishes on music, politics, and the arts.