Big news – we’re spinning off a new organization focused on arming movements for liberation with the tools to fight the tech that oppresses us. We’re so excited to share more about People’s Tech Project with you – and you can sign up now to learn more as it grows, and visit People’s Tech’s new website!
For over 15 years, Movement Alliance Project has dug deeply into issues of racism, tech justice, and inequality. We’ve brought together powerful communities to run campaigns that expanded affordable internet and cable (1), exposed the way harmful algorithms reinforce bias to keep people incarcerated (2), and held giants like Comcast accountable to the communities that are the source of their profits (3). This work has created meaningful change , and illuminated the many ways technology continues to change the landscape on which we fight, while exacerbating the injustices we organize against. We are so proud of the power we’ve built and wielded together.
During the MAPOut strategic planning process last year, it became clear to all of us that MAP’s core purpose of supporting the growth of a healthy movement ecosystem in Philadelphia remains necessary, and requires our full focus.
But we also realized that many of the other big questions we’ve asked over our long history still need to be answered: How has the terrain on which we fight, particularly around communications and technology, shifted? How are corporate giants’ uses of technology weaponized against us? How do governments use technology to aggravate the material conditions everyday people face? And how do we confront this reality to build a future where technology is liberatory, rather than oppressive? These questions were so crucial to address that we’ve spent months building a new organization to grow from the legacy of our pathbreaking campaigns.
Today, we’re so proud and excited to introduce People’s Tech Project, our newest sponsored project that is prepared to answer these big questions in our shared fight for liberation.
Through building deep assessments with communities of how technology aggravates the conditions they face, supporting campaigns that include those assessments, and cohering a key segment of the movement for tech justice to work in accountable relationship to movements for liberation, People’s Tech will help our movements develop a positive vision of how technology can contribute to the logic of a liberatory world, rather than serve as the linchpin of an economic system that puts profit over people and planet.
Sign up now at People’s Tech to stay updated on the latest news at the intersection of technology and inequality, and hear more about their campaigns and research.
In a moment of great potential for our movements to dramatically shift the power map in favor of everyday people, People’s Tech’s will play a key role: to ensure that social movements contend with the impacts of technology both on human conditions and on the strategy they are building for human liberation.
We know People’s Tech is in good hands. Four incredible leaders from MAP will launch this new project: former policy organizers Devren Washington and Jenessa Irvine, communications coordinator Shari Bolar-Martray, and longtime policy director Hannah Sassaman.
As People’s Tech launches and MAP evolves and grows, our shared goal remains the same: Full liberation for all people. While MAP focuses in on the needs of Philly’s left movement ecosystem, People’s Tech will fully focus on how tech aggravates conditions for those communities to build power. Learn more about how People’s Tech will do that by signing up for their email list here, and visit their beautiful new homepage here.
This work grew from the rich history and campaigns that we all have made possible together. We’re so excited for People’s Tech to meet this challenge, for MAP to continue to be a partner every step of the way, and for all of us to help shape this project as it continues to grow.
