The ICT-Buen Vivir Paradox: Using Digital Tools to Defend Indigenous Cultures

Abstract: Arguably shaped by political economy perspectives from the Global North, ICT4D aims to reduce socioeconomic disparities across countries and regions through ICT implementations, as well as to open up opportunities for empowerment and human development. Despite these aims, ICT4D has been criticized because 1) although ICT and internet have positive effects on societies across the Global North, their positive impact on people's lives in the Global South cannot be easily proved; 2) ICT4D's primary focus seems to be on ICT's series of artefacts rather than on ICT's positive transformative potential of living conditions in the world; 3) the type of development ICT4D aims for could mask global hegemonic interests and seek neoliberal restructuring within less socioeconomically favoured communities within the Global South. For these reasons, claim scholars, ICT4D should be revised. By presenting ICT appropriations among Wixarika peoples in Mexico to protect their sacred land, this paper aims to 1) shed a light on the need for postcolonial critical frameworks on what 'development' associated with ICT should be and 2) to foster discussions on whether ICT can enable alternative voices from the Global South to be heard, despite tensions between traditional views and contemporary technologies.