Datafication and Democracy Fund awards new round of Global South projects on infrastructure, inclusion, and democratic accountability

The Datafication and Democracy Fund Committee, composed of Data Privacy Brasil, Paradigm Initiative, and Aapti Institute, is pleased to announce the organizations awarded funding for short-term research and advocacy projects under the Fund’s second edition. It was a lengthy, highly competitive selection process, with more than 80 proposals submitted from across the Global South. 

The selected organizations work across different regions and political contexts, but all of them engage with a shared concern: how datafication is reshaping democratic life in the Global South. Their projects examine some of the most pressing challenges in the field today, including the expansion of data centers and their resource footprint, the governance of digital public infrastructure, disability inclusion, community-led data governance, transparency gaps in data governance, women’s participation in data policy, the role of trade agreements in shaping digital regulation, and the democratic implications of electoral technologies.

Sinar Project, based in Malaysia, will investigate how the physical infrastructure of datafication affects local resources and democratic oversight. Through satellite imagery, computer vision, and policy analysis, the project will generate independent evidence on the footprint of data centers in Malaysia, produce open datasets and visual documentation, and develop advocacy materials to support civil society and journalists working on transparency and accountability in digital infrastructure governance. By making visible the environmental and territorial impacts of data infrastructure that often remain opaque to affected communities, the project seeks to strengthen public scrutiny over decisions that shape resource allocation, land use, and local governance.

Keystone Foundation, headquartered in India, will examine how digital public infrastructures intersect with Indigenous knowledge systems and self-governance in the Nilgiri region of Tamil Nadu, India. Focusing on the Toda, Kota, Irula, and Kurumba communities, the project will analyze how land records systems, biodiversity and forest portals, identity records, and related databases transform community-governed knowledge into standardized and extractable data. By tracing how Indigenous ecological knowledge moves from lived experience and oral memory into institutional databases, the research will explore the democratic implications of digitisation for Indigenous consent, autonomy, and participation in governance processes that affect their territories and ways of life The project will also produce case studies and an advocacy toolkit proposing principles for Indigenous-inclusive digital public infrastructure design and ongoing, community-led consent mechanisms.

FungAI Africa Initiative, from Zimbabwe, will conduct a democratic audit of digital public infrastructure across East and Southern Africa, focusing on Zambia, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Rwanda, Kenya, and Tanzania. The project will examine how legal, institutional, and contractual arrangements surrounding DPI shape democratic accountability, transparency, and the protection of fundamental rights. In addition to comparative research, the initiative aims to develop an advocacy and oversight toolkit to support media, civil society, and public oversight bodies.

Webfala Digital Skills for All Initiative, active in Nigeria, will explore barriers to digital inclusion for people with disabilities in African contexts, with a particular focus on accessibility in digital public infrastructure and data governance frameworks. The project seeks to identify structural, technological, institutional, and social obstacles to inclusion, while also highlighting policy and design approaches that can make digital systems more accessible, rights-respecting, and responsive to the lived experiences of persons with disabilities. By centering accessibility as a democratic issue, the project draws attention to how exclusion from digital systems can limit participation in public life, restrict access to rights and services, and weaken the inclusiveness of data-driven governance.

Women in Data Science and AI project will concentrate on the Zambian context, exploring the impact of datafication on democratic participation and governance from a gender and inclusion perspective. The project responds to the exclusion of women and marginalized groups from data governance debates by combining research, capacity-building, and multistakeholder policy dialogue. It aims to strengthen data literacy and democratic oversight while producing actionable policy recommendations for more inclusive and accountable data practices.

PolicyLab Africa, based in Nigeria, will investigate how biometric and digital electoral technologies shape voter participation and exclusion in the country. Focusing on voter registration and accreditation systems, the project will document how data-driven infrastructures can create barriers for marginalized groups and affect access to political participation. In light of Nigeria’s upcoming 2027 elections, the research seeks to generate practical insights for civil society, election stakeholders, and policymakers concerned with democratic inclusion and electoral fairness.

Associação Quilombola de Santa Tereza, from Brazil, will develop a community-based response to extractive data practices by co-creating a Community Data Governance Protocol in a quilombola territory. The project combines critical mapping of data extraction with participatory governance design, documenting concrete cases of imposed datafication and building a collectively defined framework for community stewardship, informed consent, ethical use, and community benefit. It will also include training activities and educational materials to enable the methodology to be shared with other communities.

Global Data Barometer, structured in Uruguay, will examine how datafication can erode democratic accountability when transparency frameworks exist on paper but fail in practice. Drawing on comparative evidence from countries in Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean, the project will analyze recurring gaps between formal data governance commitments and the actual availability, usability, and interoperability of information needed for public oversight. Its goal is to equip civil society with analytical tools to assess data reforms beyond surface-level transparency claims.

Asociación por los Derechos Civiles (ADC), based in Argentina, will analyze how trade agreements and digital economy rules within Mercosur shape models of data governance in the region. The project addresses an important evidence gap regarding how cross-border data flow rules, e-commerce provisions, and related legal mechanisms interact with national regulatory frameworks and influence digital rights, democratic accountability, and regulatory autonomy. By situating Mercosur in a broader comparative perspective, the research will offer valuable inputs for advocacy and critical reflection in Latin America.

Taken together, these projects show that datafication is not merely a technical process. It is deeply political, shaping who is seen, who is counted, who is excluded, and who gets to exercise oversight over digital systems. From data centers and public infrastructure to trade regimes and voting technologies, the selected projects reveal how the governance of data is increasingly central to democratic life in the Global South. They also demonstrate the importance of building context-specific, rights-based, and community-informed responses to these transformations.

We are excited to support this new cohort of projects and look forward to accompanying their development over the coming months. We hope the research, tools, and public-facing outputs produced through this second edition of the Fund will contribute to stronger civil society engagement, deeper regional exchange, and more democratic approaches to data governance across the Global South.