Message from the Chair
Change is the only constant.
LIRNEasia marked its 15th anniversary in September 2019. LIRNEasia at 15 was very different from the little organization that started off in a single room, with the conference table under a tree and the financial files in Prashanthi’s house. Ways of working had changed for the better. But most significant was that our research and capacity building had also changed with the times.
Message from the Chair
Change is the only constant.
LIRNEasia marked its 15th anniversary in September 2019. LIRNEasia at 15 was very different from the little organization that started off in a single room, with the conference table under a tree and the financial files in Prashanthi’s house. Ways of working had changed for the better. But most significant was that our research and capacity building had also changed with the times.
In 2004, a funding agency which appeared to have resources (but actually did not) and a potential university partner wanted us to shift our priorities from infrastructure and access to the emerging flavor of the day: Internet governance. We refused. But for the last 10 years we have been gradually moving up the value chain and now cover many aspects of Internet governance. We changed because we saw the conditions on the ground had changed.
Change can be gradual, simply new leadership, the churn of researchers and the accumulations of small accommodations made while negotiating funds. Or it can be a step change. Planned. The 15th anniversary and the annual strategic review gave impetus to change. The gradual processes are being complemented by transformative actions.
We can no longer stop our work once the presentation has been made to the decision makers. We have concluded that we must now be more open to situational coordination with boundary partners who can use (or abuse) our findings. That we should add to the audiences we address. Whereas we used to focus on key decision makers and had a secondary focus on media channels that attracted their attention, we now must engage with larger audiences in multiple languages and channels.
Why? Because societies are increasingly polarized, and the weight given to evidence is declining. Challenging the messenger used to be the last resort when the message was difficult to take down. Now, the first thing is to challenge the motivation of the speaker, her pedigree, her funding and who she sat next to at a public meeting. One must survive the attack on one’s ethos, to even get the opportunity present the argument with the right balance between logos and pathos.
Research organizations draw their legitimacy from logos. That cannot change unless they anchor their legitimacy on something else. But conveying the research findings effectively to boundary partners may allow the message to get through.
The 2016 World Development Report, Digital Dividends, confirmed a key element that was in our approach from the very start: ICT interventions by themselves rarely yield the desired results; they have to be accompanied by the right kinds of “analog complements,” at the right time. We saw this very clearly in our early work on ICTs in agriculture. Improving price information was not enough. It had to go with the institution of forward contracts and futures exchanges.
Effective solutions require holistic research and multi-pronged communication. We have always been multi-disciplinary, but we now have to be even more. We must work with more partners, letting go of control.
The Big Data for Development group that has been active since 2012 exemplifies the change. Now renamed the Data Algorithms and Policy (DAP) workstream, the intention is to increasingly integrate data-science elements into all projects, not just a subset. The efficacy of the boundary partners with whom we are working to develop proposals related to COVID-19 will be test of a new way of doing research and new ways of getting research to policy.
Also showing the way is phase two of the work on assistive technologies for persons with disabilities (PWDs) in India. Here, research conducted on the barriers to independent living by PWDs form the basis of a pre-accelerator that will bring together developers and potential funders to hopefully establish an accelerator lab to be hosted by Vihara Innovation Network, a design and innovation focused partner. While LIRNEasia will continue to be engaged, design and operation of an accelerator lab not an area where it has any significant competencies relative to its partner. But it is how we’ll actually get solutions to the PWDs.
Changes being implemented gradually at LIRNEasia include the induction of two new members to the Board of Directors. Ms Thusitha Perera is Executive Director, Camso Global Business Services Center Sri Lanka, after an international career. The other new director Ms Jeeva Perumalpillai-Essex retired in 2015 as Regional Manager at the International Finance Corporation, a unit of the World Bank Group that she served in various capacities since 1991. Mr Luxman Siriwardene, one of the founder directors who made an invaluable contribution to the establishment of LIRNEasia, retired.
Advisory boards have been formed for the disability and assistive technology projects being implemented in India and Sri Lanka, and for the Data Algorithms and Policy workstream. More intensive engagement with advisory boards is planned at the level of projects.
These gradual changes, hopefully supplemented by qualitative shifts, will transform LIRNEasia, again. And when that is done, we’ll do it all over again.
Rohan Samarajiva
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Message from the CEO
This financial year ends and this message is being written as most of the world is going into COVID-19 shut down. Luckily, our staff, research and policy fellows who live in different countries have always worked and interacted remotely – using a range of communication tools to interact as if we were all present in the office at the same time. The early signs are that we are able to continue much of our routine research by working remotely, from our homes and as we did before. But what of our field research?
Message from the CEO
This financial year ends and this message is being written as most of the world is going into COVID-19 shut down. Luckily, our staff, research and policy fellows who live in different countries have always worked and interacted remotely – using a range of communication tools to interact as if we were all present in the office at the same time. The early signs are that we are able to continue much of our routine research by working remotely, from our homes and as we did before. But what of our field research? LIRNEasia has always insisted that seeing how people live their lives and interact (or can’t interact) with technology in a particular context is key to finding polices that work for them. Otherwise we wouldn’t have worried about nationally representative surveys of the poor all the way back in 2005 that proved over 90% of the poor in Asia had made and received phone calls, even though multilateral policy wonks were saying the poor don’t make calls. Or we wouldn’t have seen that financially conscious users in the Philippines were willing to change their SIM Cards up to six times a day in order to get the benefits of cheaper on-net calling rates. This is the only way we have been able to recommend policy solutions that are useful for the context people in emerging Asia live, instead of taking “cut paste” recommendations from more advanced economies. In the coming few months, we have to grapple with how to study the people we care about the most: persons with disabilities, women, gender-non binary persons, ethnic and religious minorities, those at the base of the socio-economic pyramid. Because they are also often digitally disconnected, and because digital research methods pose their own challenges, we are grappling with how to conduct field research. Indications are that international travel could also grinding a halt, and it will challenge how we will interact with policy makers, regulators and other stakeholders in the region. This is the time to rely on and truly test the limits of digital connectivity. And to build on existing and long term partnerships that don’t rely on face to face interactions.
We had already started thinking of partnerships differently. With our earliest recommendations, our work of catalyzing policy change ended after we disseminate our results to those who can act on it. But most recommendations we make need to be developed further before they can be implemented. So over time, we moved into not just finding the problems through research and presenting policy solutions, but also prototyping possible solutions. This has brought new partners, such as those who use design thinking, into our orbit. It has also increased the measurable impact we can have – as we saw with the creation of concrete assistive technology solutions for disabled persons in Nepal that were implemented by teams we worked with, and what is happening with the accelerator lab we are running for innovators in India. This year we decided to further integrate parterships into our work – not at the end, but bringing in implementation partners early, at project design and conceptualization stage, and working with them more closely throughout the research life cycle.
This year LIRNEasia turned 15. We celebrated with a focus on Sri Lanka, with a public panel that questioned and discussed the policy priorities and policy instruments the country should be developing. It was followed by a small gathering of our staff, long term partners and former colleagues. We always say there is no such thing as a former colleague – one leaves LIRNEasia for other jobs or to pursue education, but one usually comes back or ends up collaborating with us in some way). This was certainly true in the faces at our 15th anniversary, and certainly true of the additions and departures from the LIRNEasia team. Sriganesh Lokanathan who was instrumental in setting up and leading the Data Analytics Policy thematic research at LIRNEasia, left to start work at the UN Pulse Lab, Jakarta as a Data Scientist. This was his second departure from LIRNEasia (previously to pursue work in the USA, followed by policy school in Singapore). Tahani Iqbal was also on her second iteration at LIRNEasia, and left to start her job at Facebook. Shazna Zuhyle left to take care of a family business venture, but is back part time, helping manage the Data Alorithms Policy (DAP) team. Thavisha managed many projects at LIRNEasia and left to take care of family, while Samali joined her (new) husband in Australia. Firaz and Yashothra went to pursue other employment, while Lasantha left to persue his PhD. The revolving door continued when Ramathi, who had worked with us as in intern while she was still in school returned to Sri Lanka upon completing her Masters, and joined the DAP team. Gayashi is the latest team member to join us just before we had to shut down the office due to COVID-19. Researchers weren’t the only people to join the LIRNEasia family – Tharaka and his wife welcomed their son Tharul, and we are looking forward to welcoming him to the office.
Helani Galpaya
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