Kyung Sun (Karen) Lee

We conducted a meta-analytic study of recent (2009 to 2020) information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) research in the field of development communication. Our aim was to explore the conceptualization of participation in the context of ICTs and globalization in contemporary scholarly discourse. We found that most studies published during this period evinced a technological deterministic discourse regarding the process of social change, privileging modernization and neoliberal modes of development. In such contexts, participation has often been conceptualized in terms of invitations to 'access' (first-level of participation) and 'empowerment' (secondlevel of participation) at the local level. Despite increasing concern regarding global digital inequalities, research that approaches participation in terms of claims to 'social justice' (third-level of participation) associated with global forces has been limited. We found, however, that research emerging from the communication and media disciplines have shown skepticism regarding the dominant trends. The paper concludes with a discussion of future directions in ICT4D for scholars across disciplines.

This study analyzes cultural mediation in international exchange participant blogs, exploring their significance for relational public diplomacy. We recognize exchange participant blogs as a site of public diplomacy at work. Moving beyond the dominant assumption guiding exchange programs as exporting values and ideas to foreign publics, we consider the extent to which the public engages in the processes of meaning making. Narrative inquiry of blogs written by participants of German and Japanese government exchange programs finds that the participants negotiate their everyday encounters with the host by personalizing, translating, and coproducing their experiences for and with the audience. The narratives convey a complicated and nuanced understanding of the host country that is interpreted through the lens of cultural and social identity embodied by the participants. The sequential and the fiction-like storytelling quality of the blogs transport audiences into the narrative world, resulting in enjoyment, emotional attachment, and identification with bloggers from their audience.

This study examines Korea’s international development volunteer program as a citizen diplomacy initiative. Informed by a cultural perspective of transmission and relational models of public diplomacy, I examine the ways in which volunteer training incorporates cultural-learning into its program. The study finds that volunteer training is largely based on an instrumentalist approach to culture that places emphasis on learning the “explicit” side of culture, such as Korean traditional dance, art, and food as a strategy to promote the country’s national image. In contrast, much less covered in the training program is a relational approach to culture-learning that is guided by a reflexive understanding of the “implicit” side of culture, or the values and beliefs that guide the worldviews and behavior of both volunteers and host constituents. Whereas the value of the volunteer program as a citizen diplomacy initiative is in its potential to build relationships based on two-way engagement, its conception of culture is mostly guided by that of the transmission model of public diplomacy. Based on the findings, this study calls for an integrated approach to culture-learning in volunteer training program to move the citizen diplomacy initiative forward.

This chapter critically engages with Korea’s international voluntary
action and the changing geopolitics of development. The country
actively publicizes its volunteer activities as an embodiment of the
ethos of harmony and horizontal relations that volunteerism conveys.
However, such an ideal of humanitarianism thinly masks the idea of linear progress and hierarchical world order inherent in Korea’s narrative
of development, which is worked into the narrative trope of “giving
back what it has received.” This study looks at the implications of such
ingrained principles and ideas upon which development has been historically constructed as asymmetrical hierarchies for relationships between the development actor and the beneficiary. Drawing on critical scholarship of development communication, I highlight how Korean volunteers struggle to navigate the underlying social structures and systems of knowledge that advantage some and disadvantage others as development actors. Embedded in the dominant imaginary of development and Korea’s hierarchical worldview, the volunteers are constantly self-aware of their inferior status that is tied to the national, racial, and gendered imaginaries of development. The chapter goes on to discuss implications of such tensions in volunteer–host relations for international development volunteering as grassroots public diplomacy practice.

Drawing on the concept of information subsidy, this study explores the network neutrality debate in the context of Twitter. Content analysis of the top 150 most retweeted URLs demonstrates that the composition of information subsidizers on Twitter was more or less evenly divided among stakeholders, including government, industry, nonprofit/advocacy, and experts. Despite the diversity of sources, there was a clear lack of diversity in stance. The majority of sources displayed a favorable attitude toward net neutrality. Our findings highlight the potential of Twitter to represent the position of resource-poor information subsidizers, including advocacy groups, entrepreneurs, and race-based online communities, as they seek to uphold the neutrality of the Internet.