Inclusive Digital Transformation: check out the declaration with recommendations to the G20

The T20 Brazil Task Force on Inclusive Digital Transformation announces the launch of a statement with recommendations to the G20. The recommendations were made by a multidisciplinary team from different countries, members of think tanks and research centers, across 6 themes.

The Task Force aimed to balance the challenges of digitalization and datafication with the economy, development, and the protection of rights and vulnerable individuals. To achieve its objectives, the Working Group promoted collaboration between other T20 Task Forces and different engagement groups, while simultaneously continuing the work initiated by previous G20 presidencies.

According to Jaqueline Pigatto, coordinator of the Governance and Regulation area at Data Privacy Brasil and Deputy lead co-chair in the Task Force, the work lasted around six months between meetings, policy brief evaluations and side events, which resulted in the document end, and adds:

“It was a joint construction of different expertises and from different regions of the world, but emphasizing a holistic look at a data justice approach within the six established thematic areas. The result is a direct dialogue with the priorities of the Brazilian agenda, which can also influence other countries in the Global South”.

In addition to the four priority themes of the Digital Economy Working Group – Meaningful Connectivity, Digital Government, Information Integrity and Artificial Intelligence – the document also addresses recommendations in the areas of Decent Work, Data Governance, Digital Inclusion and Regulation of Digital Platforms.

According to Bruno Bioni, founding director of Data Privacy Brasil and Lead co-chair of the Task Force, one of the highlights of the policy recommendations is the creation of D20 – a cooperation and dialogue space – to discuss data governance:

“Data is the constitutive and foundational element of old and new technologies, including the most prominent of recent times, Artificial Intelligence. It is essential to look at this anteroom, to take a step back, to analyze the entire film and not just the photography. We need to reflect on the logic of data production and extraction: who produces it, who analyzes it for what and for whom? Such questions are central to reducing inequalities and developing capabilities, especially so that there is no oppression, also to the detriment of the Global South, as we have seen in other moments of so-called technological progress”.

In this sense, Bruno highlights that the D20 would be a space for coordination and mainly for the construction of a positive and emancipatory agenda on data: “The D20 would not be a new engagement group in itself, but, both on the governmental track and in the G20 Social, a congregation space. Simultaneously and in parallel, governments and civil society would focus their reflections around such a transversal theme: from health to climate justice. With this, coordinate efforts, still fragmented today, on such a critical asset for combating inequalities and a more sustainable planet”, he emphasizes.

The Task Force had a unique and extremely important participation, given that, with Brazil’s presidency, the G20 must establish a common position on data governance, recognizing power asymmetries caused or improved by technologies and the data that support them, and develop tools to deal with them, considering the epistemologies of the Global South in particular. To check the recommendations, access the link.