Yesterday, we had the pleasure of presenting Map Kibera at a networking meeting for organizations who share the common goal of ending gender based violence (GBV) in Kibera. The meeting was led by Population Services International (PSI) and attended by service providers (Kenyatta Hospital) and grassroots groups (Youth Development Forum, Kibera Shelter, Women’s Empowerment Link).
While there was strong consensus around mapping hot spots where young girls are particularly at risk (more on that soon), the most interesting discussion was around making  our SMS short code available to young women for reporting GBV (so far we are planning on using the shortcode for (i) community news reporting to Voice of Kibera; and (ii) SMS responder corps to report on health care and public safety issues). We’ve thought about the question of emergency response quite a bit, and see at least two distinct challenges:
– Emergency Responders- First do no harm. For an SMS responder service to be useful, first there needs to be responders. Folks at our meeting felt this was an ongoing challenge, and there is an effort to create a flow chart of who is responsible for what, where and when when it comes to GBV. When this flow chart is active and in place, it would be great to float the idea of an SMS short code.
– Norms- People know things in Kibera by talking to one another face to face. Reporting something as deeply personal as a sexual assault would require a dramatic change of normative behavior. Like a Ugandan farmer buddy of mine who would rather ride to town (at 3X cost) than use Google’s Farmer’s Friend to get crop growing tips, behavior change is difficult: the payoff has to be overwhelming, obvious and guaranteed.
My hunch, and I’d like to hear what health behavior change folks think, is that our SMS code is better for extracting tacit knowledge that would otherwise stay amongst a small number of people (i.e. there is a drug shortage at this clinic, or, many young girls are complaining about how dangerous the main road in gatwikera village is this week) than for direct emergency response.
Hi. I’m Josh Goldstein. I’m proud to announce that UNICEF is partnering with Map Kibera for Phase II of the project. Our goal is to explore how open mapping data and new media can empower the most vulnerable communities.
Two symbols of this era of open data are President Obama’s Open Governance Initiative, a directive that has led agencies to post their results online and open up data sets, and Ushahidi, a tool for crowdsourcing crisis information. While these tools are bringing openness to governance and crisis response respectively, I believe we have yet to find a good answer to the question: what does open data means for the long-term social and economic development of poor and marginalized communities?
I came to Nairobi on a hunch. The hunch was that a small digital mapping experiment taking place in the Kibera slum would matter deeply, both for Kiberans who want to improve their community, and for practitioners keen to use technology to bring the voiceless into a conversation about how resources are allocated on their behalf.
So far I haven’t been disappointed. As readers of this blog know, Map Kibera, an effort to create the first publicly available map of Kibera, is the brainchild of Mikel Maron, a technologist and Open Street Map founder, and Erica Hagen, a new media and development expert, and is driven by a group of 13 intrepid mappers from the Kibera community. In partnership with SODNET (an incredible local technology for social change group), Phase I was the creation of the initial map layer on Open Street Map (see Mikel’s recent presentation at Where 2.0). Phase II, with the generous support of UNICEF, will focus on making the map useful for even the most marginalized groups, particularly young girls and young women, within the Kibera community.
What we have in mind is quite simple: add massive amounts of data to the map around 3 categories (health services, public safety/vulnerability and informal education) then experiment with ways to increase awareness and the ability to advocate for better service provision. The resulting toolbox, which will involve no tech (drawing on printed maps), and tech (SMS reporting, Ushahidi and new media creation) will help us collectively answer questions about how open data itself, and the narration of such data through citizen media and face-to-face conversations, can help even the most marginalized transform their communities.
We hope the methodology we develop, which will be captured on our
wiki, can be incorporated into other communities around Kenya, and to places like Haiti, where it is critical to enable Haitians to own their own vision of a renewed nation.
