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Mobile (for) Development

When Digital Giants Take Care of Poor Women

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2022

Marine Al Dahdah
Affiliation:
Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris

Summary

With their widespread use in the Global South, mobile phones are attracting growing interest from international aid actors and local authorities alike, who are positioning mobile technology as a growth driver and a solution to many social problems. Initiated by giants of the digital industry, these policies are reviving old questions about technological development, the relationship between the market sector and States, and the role of technology in the inequalities between the Global North and Global South. Through a multi-sited ethnography on maternal care in Ghana and India, this Element provides a first-hand look at initiatives that promise to improve poor women's health in the Global South through the use of mobile phones; a field known as Mobile Health or mHealth. Attentive to the way in which these technical objects modify power relations at both international and local levels, this Element also discusses how mHealth transforms care practices and healthcare.
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Mobile (for) Development
  • Marine Al Dahdah, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris
  • Online ISBN: 9781009202398
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Mobile (for) Development
  • Marine Al Dahdah, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris
  • Online ISBN: 9781009202398
Available formats
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To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

Mobile (for) Development
  • Marine Al Dahdah, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Paris
  • Online ISBN: 9781009202398
Available formats
×