Bridging the Digital Divide While Preparing the Ground for Extraction? A Power Analysis of Facebook's Connectivity Initiatives in the Majority World

Abstract

This thesis investigates the innate tension between Big Tech's involvement in simultaneously pursuing development and profit maximisation objectives. Facebook and, in particular, the subunit of Facebook Connectivity serve as the case study illustrating how Doris Fuchs’ theoretical framework of business strength and fragility finds applicability within the context of Big Tech. The research objectives are to extend the theoretical framework with platform and infrastructure studies literature to reveal power concentration schemes specific to the tech sector and, second, allow for unravelling histories of resistance to colonial struggles across the Majority World. Insights derived from the analysis include that: (1) there is a need for better lobby control and accountability mechanisms to restrict Big Tech’s undemocratic shaping of the regulatory landscape; (2) human rights impact assessments should inform Internet infrastructure projects; (3) Facebook's complicity in bolstering, renewing or discontinuing existing power relations between ex-colonisers and ex-colonised nations should be appraised; (4) abusive data extraction practices need to be scrutinised especially within the context of development interventions; (5) Facebook's ability to frame the debate around the digital divide and connectivity and favourably shape the general societal attitudes allow for the generation of epistemic power that could lead to an "epistemic coup"; and (6) scandals and decolonial grassroots organising can lead to irrevocable damage of corporate legitimacy and the discontinuation of connectivity initiatives when governing institutions are unhampered by corruption steered by the transnational capitalist class. More empirical research similar to this needs to scrutinise this tension to avoid the exploitation of people across the world.