Retrospective Learnings From Actioning these Pathways

While the actual implementation of the identified pathways depends on the stage of the relevant challenge, a range of overarching considerations can help maximise the impact of last-mile execution.

Use ‘team of teams’ in designing solutions: Changing systems for a particular challenge requires multiple and differential interventions over a sustained period of time. Having a long-term strategic focus on one problem, investing in multiple systems-change pathways for the same, and leveraging diverse stakeholders can result in maximising the impact in the long run. For example, research and evidence-building can be coupled with user behaviour change initiatives to solve issues around nonconsensual data collection, sharing, and usage.

Collaborative work is integral to minimise the benefit and risk trade-offs of digital society: Beyond doubt, the digital society has provided new ways of building efficient communication, systems and processes. Hence, we require solutions that can minimise risks while maintaining the benefits being accrued. This requires multi-stakeholder participation to design holistic solutions. Bringing together dedicated philanthropic funders, investors, researchers, grassroots implementers, businesses, developers, and entrepreneurs will enable a more holistic view. This could be done through the development of issue-specific and stakeholder-specific collectives.

Deepening the end-beneficiary lens in the interventions can enable targeted impact for the pathway: As the usage of digital technologies vary across different individuals and communities, their awareness and access to solutions also varies. This leads to differential vulnerabilities of individuals to the risks of a digital society. Consequently, keeping them in consideration when designing and executing interventions can enable scalable and long-term change in the system. For instance, designing solutions for online harassment would require drawing upon the lived experiences of women and gender minorities, who are trying to make social media platforms safer by filing content moderation requests.

Systems change is non-linear and evolves over a period of time, thus requiring patient capital investments: Systems change occurs in a non-linear fashion. It involves empowering the ecosystem and building its capacity to react to critical events and inflection points. This preparedness of the system can be built by establishing long-term funding streams that are able to reflect on the success of the interventions.