Paper details

Paper authors	Anna Skeels
In panel on	Ethics and Technology in Humanitarian Settings
Paper presenter(s) will be presenting	In-Person / Online

Abstract

The position of technology within humanitarian innovation raises substantial ethical concerns.

There’s an over-association between innovation and (often high-end) technology. This promotes a product-heavy view of innovation and prolific invention (‘pilotisis’): innovation as ‘shiny new things’ (‘neophilia’). It neglects the potential and scale-ability of lower tech solutions and more ‘frugal innovation’. It misses the complexity of most humanitarian problems that require a more systemic approach and cannot be solved by tech alone.

The humanitarian innovation agenda provides an entry point for tech in search of market expansion. These are solutions in search of a problem, rather than in response to humanitarian need. Such non-traditional actors with new products and limited sector knowledge can create a host of ethical issues for crisis affected populations. This is a risk we cannot afford to take.

A more nuanced view of technology and innovation and pursuing a more responsible and ethical innovation agenda is needed. Translators Without Borders represent an innovation where machine translation is the ‘means’ and the tech is situated within a process innovation. Sector-wide principles and tools for ethical humanitarian innovation and a Humanitarian Innovation Guide orienting non-humanitarians in crisis-affected contexts would better situate these actors amidst the responsibilities involved.

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