Research Partnerships with Developing Countries
A Programme funded by Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC)

RE-ACT (social REpresentations of community multimedia centers and ACTions for improvement)

RE-ACT joint research project will investigate conceptualizations of CMCs - Community Multimedia Centres - in Mozambique by representatives of initiating agencies, representatives of associations owning the CMC, local staff, users and people of the community who do not use CMC using the Social Representation construct. During the project a tool to study and analyze CMCs conceptualization will be developed and tested; furthermore the results of the above-mentioned analysis will be used to design and implement actions aimed at improving performances of the CMCs involved in the project. The same tool will be then used to measure the impact and effectiveness of improvement actions. In the RE-ACT project, 10 CMCs located all over the country will be involved; around 100 staff members will take part in the improvement actions with a benefit for the whole communities in which the CMCs is based. RE-ACT is run in collaboration by the Università della Svizzera italiana (NewMInE - New Media in Education Lab, which already has experiences in such research activities in developing areas) and the Universidad Eduardo Mondlane (the Department of Informatics and the Centre for African Studies), which is deeply involved in research and development efforts in the involved field.

Contacts

Professor Lorenzo Cantoni
NewMinE Lab
Facolta di scienze della comunicazione
Universita della Svizzera Italiana
Via Buffi 13
CH-6900 Lugano
lorenzo.cantoni(at)usi.ch

Mrs. Gertrudes Macueve
Informatic Centre
Eduardo Mondlane University
Av. Julius Nyerere 257
MZ- Maputo
Mozambique
g.macueve(at)uem.mz