Lunchtime Talk: Technology-Driven Sociopolitical Transformations in Ukraine: Analyzing the Gendered Impacts of the Russian War in Ukraine

The ongoing research investigates how ICT-enabled civic engagement during the Russian war in Ukraine nurtures a cohesive culture and advances gender parity through collective action. It explores the role of women and LGBTQIA+ in leveraging digital instruments for delivering solutions and providing people-to-people and people-to-government services aimed at supporting voluntarily mobilized peers and newly emerged vulnerable groups such as veterans. The study addresses how these efforts reshape societal values towards enhancing resilience and equality and contribute to democracy-building. The focus is placed on the gendered dynamics of service co-production within virtualized, internationalized volunteer networks. The Research design integrates democratization, social mobilization, and gender theories to propose a lens at their intersection for analyzing the role technology plays in civic engagement – at “action arenas” (Ostrom, 2009). It employs semi-structured interviews with civic activists. Based on ongoing research, the project aims at producing a project application offering the unpacking of the ICT-enabled civic engagement phenomenon.