- countering online polarisation through dialogue.
Background
Digital technology has enormous potential to contribute to peace as it allows unprecedented dimensions of participation and inclusion. Digital technologies can help communities understand better the risks they face in times of conflict, they can help actors of peace spread messages of tolerance, and provide more efficient participation, networking and dialogue solutions for communities.
However, today speedy digitalisation of societies is often reinforcing inequalities and excluding populations. Dividing instead of uniting; poor digitalisation processes can reinforce negative trends instead of addressing them.
Norwegian Church Aid and local partners are starting to use digital technologies for peacebuilding. However, our teams and our community-based and faith-based partners face huge challenges in terms of capacities and tools available; while actors of conflict are already exploiting digital opportunities to feed violence. This need for technological capacity represents an urgent need for collaboration across sectors.
18 NCA countries with peacebuilding activities have expressed their needs for digital tools.
Through a mapping activity, the NCA country offices have identified the spread of hate speech on social media as their main challenge, and
they have raised the need to build digital competence to be able to build social cohesion and counter violent extremism online.
The members of the Tech for Peace advisory group will:
Contribute with their time and expertise in developing a project together with NCA and partners
Help us ensure access to funding (private and institutional) for the project developed
Use their network to identify and engage potential partners (expertise and/or financial contributors and/or visibility and awareness (marketing and campaigns)
Generally, promote peace and protection of people living in violent conflict and fragile states through addressing this issue in relevant fora
