Jhai Update: Making a difference

Dear friends,

I feel I need to speak up again, and as gently and clearly as I can.

I don't want to say bad things about people and I am not.

I don't want to put the twice-field tested Jhai PC on parade. It is actually almost extinct, now. We are cooperating with the Indian government through its Center for the Development of Advanced Computing as it build a low-power, hardened, full function, software localized, user-appropriate, Indian machine based loosely on the Jhai PC. Once that is built -- and it will be very soon -- Jhai PC v1.6 is over. I certainly do not want to put our machine in competition with anyone's. Our machine speaks for itself and has for three and a half years of development and tests. But machines are not the point. The point is management.

I want to try to restate what we almost all know about development.

The best social change projects -- everywhere and in every field -- follow these principles:

-- Best designs happen when you design with the cooperation of real end users for their exact needs.
-- Designs must take into account these layers: cultural-religious, socio-economic, political -- including regulatory, technical, environmental, internet connectivity, and electrical availability. These layers must be understood in as exact detail as possible, as locally as possible.
-- Applications, for example, software applications, are best built as close to end users as possible. The devil -- in many cultures including mine, exactly the evil spirit -- is in the detail.
-- Working with people in the harshest of circumstance and with the least resources, is ultimately the way of work with least risk. If it works for the poorest people in the harshest conditions, it works for people less at risk of starvation than them.
-- When you work on a small scale first, you can find out -- then revise (just like in any creative process) -- what can work even better for your collaborators … and probably many others down the line.
-- It is all about relationships. Management is about relationships and management is the issue, not technology. The only thing you can know about a relationship is its quality. What you do to improve your relationships is golden.
-- The best managers live in the culture where their projects take place; they understand the nuances, they can build on their own assets, and they know how local influence networks work.
-- You always build on assets. Everyone has assets. The most important assets are closest to the end users.
-- Poor people need more money. Solutions should be financially sustainable and employ people.
-- Price is always a consideration but it is almost never the only consideration.
-- Billions of dollars are wasted in development activities by organizations and people that do not honor these principles.

The question, now, is how to go to scale --“ not with technical solutions per se --“ but with development management systems that are effective and efficient and may very well include ICT.

One thing I know for sure: ***The goal need be noble. ***

India is taking on this challenge of development as a nation: the end of starvation. The answer seems to include --“ not embody, just include - further democratization of information and increased access to communication, according to Mission 2007 www.mission2007.org , which is now supported by almost all critical sectors of Indian society.

The task is enormous, but it can be done when the goal is noble and work is done by enough ordinary folks whom we see as just like us.

The villain's ways are villainous
And he devises infamous plans
To ruin the poor with his lies
And deny justice to the needy.
But the man of noble mind forms noble designs
And stands firm in his nobility.

ISAIAH 32:7-8 (NEW ENGLISH BIBLE)

For me what is noble in this 2lst century is standing WITH the poor -- not for the poor or as advisor to the poor -- but with the poor, in community. What can be more noble than this?

Yours, in Peace,

Lee Thorn
Chair, Jhai Foundation
lee@jhai.org
www.jhai.org

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