Michael Gurstein

Dr. Michael Gurstein (born 1944, Edmonton, Alberta) is best known for his work in the development and definition of community informatics as the area of research and practice concerned with enabling and empowering communities through the use of Information and Communications Technology. He was born in Edmonton, Alberta, but grew up in Melfort, Saskatchewan and did his first degree at the University of Saskatchewan in Philosophy and Politics.

Gurstein holds a PhD in Social Science from Cambridge University. He worked for a number of years as a Management Consultant with his firm, Socioscope undertaking research linking organizations to information technology. While working as a Management Adviser at the United Nations in New York he was offered a post as Associate Chair in the Management of Technological Change at the University College of Cape Breton. While on Cape Breton Island he founded the Centre for Community and Enterprise Networking (C/CEN) as a community based research laboratory (what has now come to be known as a Living Lab) exploring possible applications of Information and Communications Technologies to support social change in what was then one of Canada's most economically disadvantaged regions. C/CEN, established in 1996, was a pioneer in among other areas online conference management (and did the first online conference with simultaneous translation using IRC and court translators to provide text translation in French simultaneous to the direct meeting being transcribed in English). The Centre also undertook the first NetCorps placement (in Angola) as well as providing on-line support to the local Cape Breton music industry .

Gurstein's book Community Informatics: Enabling Communities with Information and Communications Technologies (Idea Group, 2000) and the conceptual framing for Community Informatics grew out of his experiences in Cape Breton. The book was the first major publication in the Community Informatics field and introduced the term "Community Informatics" into wider usage as referring to the research and praxis discipline underpinning the social appropriation of ICT. Within the area of Community Informatics a major contribution has been Gurstein's introduction of the notion of "effective use" as a critical analytical framework for assessing technology implementation superseding approaches based on the more commonly accepted frameworks such as that of the "Digital Divide".

He is the Editor in Chief of the Journal of Community Informatics, was Foundation Chair of the Community Informatics Research Network and moderates the Community Informatics and Community Informatics Researchers elists. He is currently the Executive Director of the Centre for Community Informatics Research, Development and Training, in Vancouver Canada, Research Professor at the New Jersey Institute of Technology in Newark, New Jersey, and Research Professor at the University of Quebec (Outaouais). He is also a member of the High Level Panel of Advisers of the UN's Global Alliance for ICT and Development. . He has also served on the Board of the Global Telecentre Alliance, Telecommunities Canada, the Pacific Community Networking Association and the Vancouver Community Net and is a member of the High Level Panel of Advisors of the (UN) Global Alliance for Information and Communication Technologies and Development.

Gurstein is now writing an influential Community Informatics blog at http://gurstein.wordpress.com.