Reading this post (which I found following your Tweet about the upcoming ICT4D conference) reminds me very much of the action research project a colleague and I started this past April at the first annual Science of Team Science conference.

We’re developing a discourse diagnosis drawing upon group relations theory and critical discourse analysis. The dynamics that you mention, particularly the tensions, are developmental features of groups and discourses which hold tremendous potential for transformative development – if we (collectively) learn how to read, recognize and respond to them (rather than react). Or at least learn how to recover – together – from the reactions! I posted a series of blogposts which can be read in chronological order here, although it may be more efficient to cut to the initial summary: Matters of Team Science.

The historical trajectory of this burgeoning paradigm of (interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary or transdisciplinary) team science is rooted in the discipline of public health, but the dynamics are resonant with those emerging in the intersections of ICT with initiatives for social justice (i.e., “development”).

What became almost painfully apparent during the traditional-style SciTS conference (lecture lecture lecture Q&A, lecture lecture lecture Q&A) is the disconnect between practitioners (e.g., organizational behavior, systems design) and academics (researchers and pedagogues).

There are numerous levels of interpretational skills that are needed to facilitate cross/inter-disciplinary communication among academics, another set needed to bridge the gap between academics and practitioners, and a third set to link the beneficiaries of development services with the designers, policy-makers, and administrative implementers.

We need to do a lot more, on the quantitative side, than simply aggregate and analyze data about use. We need to set problems for quants that address the qualitative concerns of communities of users, some of whom are bound in quite traditional forms (cultural, linguistic, ethnic, religious and other) and some which transgress the historical divisions to compose and enact shared identities based on non-demographic factors.

Development will become much more effective when it begins to take seriously what people in these various communities find sensible and meaningful in the context of how they understand their needs and enjoy their own lives. Developers (in any field) cannot persist in assuming that the answers or solutions we find sensible are adequate or acceptable to the people who are expected to benefit from them.