💮 Documentation

October 18 | SESSION 5 — Areas of regulation and policy in telecoms in general and Community Networks more specifically

This session was facilitated by Claire Milne and Mariela Baladron where they talked about the overview of regulations of telecoms infrastructure and its importance to community networks. More technical than the sessions before, Claire and Mariela also shared their experiences as women in the area, and addressed the digital divide in the connection standpoint.

Key highlights:

1. Showing a map of the undersea cables from https://globe.gl/example/submarine-cables/, Claire noted there are far more undersea cables in the Global North. But in the last 40 years, the versions of the map have shown that the cables have been getting thicker and thicker in the Global South, and that is good news.
2. When we talk about cloud storage, never forget that they are just as real and energy consuming as they are stored in physical data centres all over.
3. Analogy to describe physical layers of the OSI model would be to think of it as the apartment, and the content as the person who lives there, and the layers in between as the work required to make the people who live in the apartment comfortable. They won't be comfortable if they don't have the apartment in the first place.
4. Regulations can be very useful but they are not always essential. E.g. Somalia did not have a governance or laws or policy, but they managed to have good cellular communications. Telecom companies would argue regulations are a bad idea, but the users, smaller companies, and community networks welcome them because it would grant them protection from the big companies.
5. Regulations are also important to make sure that the disadvantaged or the marginalised are also catered, as it is well documented that big telcos don't want to provide services in the communities because there's no motivation for generating profits. 
6. Regulations also ensure there is no unfairly prioritisation of one line of communication over another, hence ensuring all consumers have access to  emergency communication.
7. In some places e.g. Mexico, there are laws that state indigenous communities have the right to self-determination which allows them to to establish their means of communication and provide them with autonomy. The government often ‘forgets’ those laws when they develop projects for deploying telecommunication networks, so regulations can keep them grounded.
8. Regulations, most importantly, are to further the public interest. This can be done through many initiatives such as USF, network resilience in emergencies, cooperation in law enforcement, research and development, and boosting public revenues.
9. From the data in the ITU, 51% of the global population, which is about 4 billion people, are using the internet, while the other half are not. These people have the least access, and are the most impacted by the digital divide and inequality, especially if they are located in the rural areas. It's important to think about these problems in an intersectional way, because we can also think about inequality through the gender perspective, from a regional perspective, as well as from an international perspective and the contexts of each country.
10. When private investments are concentrated in big companies which tend to have very expensive investment expenses and long return term, community networks emerged to provide the connectivity responses needed by populations that are left out of the predominant market, creating new technological capacities in their communities.
11. Asymmetric regulation — we need to take into account all the differences between the actors and stakeholders, as they have different goals, access, infrastructure etc. We could not apply the same rules to everyone. The differences are also important to be able to avoid barriers established for some stakeholders and the provision of services.
12. The possibility for regulation is very different between different countries e.g. some countries have no regulation at all, or where there is no need for it, but some are recognised in the Constitution. Depending on the regulations, the process can lead to the opening of an entire path for the recognition of the licencing and access to the spectrum, and access of telecommunications and mobile services etc.
13. Regulations follow the spread and progress of telecommunications, which tend to spread from the richer countries to the less economically developed ones. If you want to look ahead for the future of regulations in your country, it may be helpful to look at a country that is a bit more economically developed but similar to your own.
14.  In the end, there is no unique single answer or solution that could cover all cases — no single response. We must adapt to each specific situation with every stakeholder involved. An organisation by itself doesn't really attain much, and that's the importance of working together and having to reach agreements and broadening the network.
15. It's also important to consider the internal and external situation, what's the context and the situation of the regulator, figuring out when it's best to act, or to wait, and working collectively.

“Persevere. You're going to have lots of setbacks but you mustn't let it deter you. Do not give up. You can put things on one side for a while. Maybe people need some breathing space, and it may take years before you see the results, but remember that you are building foundations possibly for other people who will come after you and they will be so grateful to you that you did.” — Claire, on one of her 5 tips for advocacy.

“The global telecoms network is a vast and complicated machine, sometimes said to be the world's largest machine, that has been revolutionised by the world's smallest machine, which is the silicon chip.” — Claire.

“What we can do as advocates is to point out to regulators that they need to work together, not just with other regulators, but also together with stakeholders e.g. community networks.” — Claire.

“Sometimes we want to move along in a quicker way, but sometimes it's also important to work with others and have this collaboration become more solid in order to be able to move these projects.” — Mariela.

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October 22 | SESSION 6 — Hacking language of intimidation: an antidote to jargon

In this session, Adriana and Karla shared their gendered experiences as women in policy and community spaces, and how they hacked the language of intimidation that had undermined and alienated women and gender diverse folks from decision-making processes in the spaces. In this enriching session, participants also shared their own experiences and strategies in countering power struggle in masculinised spaces, especially regarding language, in both plenary and breakout sessions.

Key highlights:

1. From the icebreaking session, participants shared the reasons what they were excited to find out:
   • Language is complex and while it can be used to intimidate, it can also be used to bring people together and make the spaces more inclusive.
   • Language can be used as a grounded approach to understand the problems of inclusion and exclusion in communities and in a wider world. When there are no words to explain technical terms in local languages, this can lead to further exclusion. Broadening and hacking the language can also help with content localisation.
   • Sometimes we exclude people indeliberately through language. People who are excluded feel shy to ask, hence they are further alienated. Sometimes, the exclusion is also due to people’s own doing when they are shy to ask or refuse to learn. This can be apparent in telecommunication spaces as well. 
   • Language is not limited to written or verbal words. It can manifest in our gestures, body languages, how we present ourselves in how we dress up, and many others.
2. Regulatory spaces is a masculinised space related to power and influence. There was still a huge imbalance of participation of men and women in these spaces e.g. 2007/08, only 26% of the assistants were women, the rest were men.  As such, this is reflected in their images and values e.g. you need to dress a certain way in the space, leading to further exclusion for women, gender diverse, trans, and non binary folks.
3. As the space is heavily masculinised and embedded in patriarchal values, women and gender diverse folks also find it hard to establish partnerships as they sometimes are made to compete with each other.
4. In some countries e.g. rural parts in Nigeria, the problems stemmed from the grassroots where it was believed that everything regarding tech belongs to men. Due to these cultural norms, women are further marginalised, have no voice, and power. The strategies to counter this have to start from the grassroots.
5. In addition to the power struggle between men and women, the complexities of the language of the fields in telecom, tech and CN also extends to the complexity in the technical language. Language can be jargon-y, and experts in the field would often use them to further intimidate and exclude those originally not in the field and to make themselves point of authority. 
6. Sometimes women also do acts of intimidation. This is due to being raised in a patriarchal machismo society where we were made to compete with each other. As such, it is important for women also to reflect and be self-critical.
7. The intimidation and exclusion are made even worse if you are minorities e.g. indigenous people, people with disabilities etc.
8. Do not continue to be intimidated with the language! The antidote to the language of intimidation: Learn the terminologies — there are many resources around e.g Internet, wiki, books etc.
9. If you witness an act of intimidation, use all the powers you have to stop them and help elevate the voices of those intimidated. 
10. Crafting your language to be more understandable to laypeople is also a strategy to benefit all — it is so that customers or stakeholders will also understand what you are talking about.
11. Strategies to hack the language of intimidation discussed in breakout groups (https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1J708EEOC7MA1r5uiPaV4hAgXWL1jw7jc/edit?usp=sharing&ouid=107336792764199530819&rtpof=true&sd=true):
    • Men also sometimes have their own ‘boys club’ that they would discuss about work outside of work, sometimes in places such as bars. This excluded women, who are more likely to have house chores after work or uncomfortable discussing work in bars. As such, there is a need for an inclusive network with a gender perspective where women, gender diverse folks, PWD etc. of different backgrounds e.g. academia, journalists, researchers etc. are able to exchange ideas, collaborate and do great things together. 
    • In Janastu CN in India, one of the strategies is to use storytelling to encourage women to participate within their language of comfort.
    • On the issues of cultural norms where women are excluded in tech — train girls and young women from the start, channel mentorship, collective voice where we champion one another instead of intimidating and shutting down.

Memorable quotes:

“Imagine the cultural chips he had, that he preferred to interrupt the session, come over to me, and ask me to clean up for him.” — Adriana, sharing her experiences in a sexist encounter where a CEO of an agency spilled water in the meeting room and asked her, an advisor to the chairman of a regulatory agency (hence making them of equal position, if not her, more advanced) to clean up for him.

“Men go as far as you let them go.” — Adriana.

“Rule of the jungle: if someone is intimidating you, you jump more, look taller, be smarter.” — Adriana.

“It has taken many centuries for women to have a public voice. Our predecessors in our countries have fought huge battles for women to have a voice, so now we have a responsibility of not giving up the public voice that women predecessors have helped to enable. We do not need to continue this battle for hierarchy. There are always other ways of governance, collaborative work and leadership, and collaborative language. Together we can build more inclusion than exclusion.” — Adriana, attributing the quote to Mary Beard.