My country, my development : The diffusion of information and communication technologies in Cambodian NGOs

Abstract: The purpose of this research is to study the role of information and communication technology (ICT) and information and communication technology for development (ICT4D) in Cambodian non-government organizations (NGOs). By focusing on a workshop on the ICT applications Unicode and Open Office, initiated by the Cooperation Committee for Cambodia (the CCC), I intend to see how these applications were adopted, how they are used and what the future is for ICT and ICT4D in Cambodia. The research is based on qualitative, semi structured interviews with employees at CCC as well as NGO workers who were participants at the workshops. The theories that I have used are Amartya Sen’s capability approach, Everett Rogers’ diffusion of innovation theory and intercultural communication. This study shows that ICT is considered to be a very important tool for the development of Cambodia. Unicode has contributed with an easier way to type and read documents in Khmer and it is considered to promote the Khmer language. Open Office have not found its renaissance yet since people find it difficult to use although the NGOs sees its’ potential and wants to learn it. According to the NGO workers, ICT and ICT4D will play an important role for the Cambodian development in the future but because of a lack of infrastructure and proper knowledge about the new technology, it has not been used to its full capacity. In order for us to understand how ICT can reach its full potential within NGOs, there have to exist an understanding of Cambodian culture and history since the Khmer people’s values affect how the NGO workers look at development and the tools they are using.