As technology evolves, its growing role in democratic processes has become increasingly visible, with election candidates around the world incorporating AI into their campaigns. Seerat Khan argues that in an industry lacking effective regulation, this integration fuels political disinformation, often amplified by tech companies seeking to profit from heightened engagement.

Through the third cycle of Feminist Internet Research Network (FIRN) and this edition, the FIRN team has attempted to offer a different perspective on who gets recognition as a knowledge producer and how research can be a political act that disrupts knowledge formation, serving as an entry point for networking, connecting and movement building. 

Gulbakhor reflected on the challenges in navigating a research on TFGBV in Tajikistan, where domestic violence and marital rape are not criminalised, reinforced by a culture of silence and spaces for women to be heard is almost non-existence.

This article by MariaLab reflects on the redefinition of technology and science as cultural carrier bags instead of weapons of domination. Throughout their research, they seek to challenge the traditional dichotomies of subject and object and conventional notions of scientific rigour when working to establish more horizontal and collaborative research relationships.

The research team from the University of Cape Town (UCT) discuss their use of decolonial feminism in their contribution to feminist politics of knowledge building and centering of participants’ voices in the research and knowledge co-creation with the participants in their research project.

In researching the multiple ways violence against LGBTQIA+ take place in Ethiopia, Martha and S.A. reflected how the broader social, cultural and political environment influence the process and how they work together collaboratively based on shared values and ethics despite the differences in terms of perspective, approaches and emotional response.