The Politics of “Tech for Good”

Over the last 30 years, the world's leaders have realized that while innovation systems have brought us important technologies and economic prosperity, they have not benefitted everyone. Potentially life-saving pharmaceuticals are inaccessible to many, while some technologies reflect and reinforce structural inequalities. Meanwhile, wealth and income inequality are increasing. One solution, loosely called “inclusive innovation”, aims to explicitly incorporate the world’s marginalized communities into the innovation system as consumers, laborers, and even innovators. My current book project investigates the evolution, implementation, and moral and political impacts of this approach, with a focus on sanitation and menstrual health and hygiene in India.