Who Uses Mobile Technology to Improve Governance?

This proposal seeks support for an in depth study of a group of rural villages in Uganda in an effort to understand who participates in the use of mobile technology programs. We are currently engaged in the evaluation of a program being rolled out as part of a randomized controlled trial under the auspices of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). The program aims to facilitate communication between service providers, local officials, and citizens through SMS messages and phone polls. Using resources from a previous SEED exploratory grant, we have run a variety of experiments aimed at encouraging citizens to use the service. We now propose to do a careful exploration of patterns of use, including an analysis of village-level social networks.