Introduction

This chapter discusses the evaluation and assessment of technology, and the design of technical artefacts and the development of socio-technical networks as ways to bring about a positive social change. A technical term often used in the capability approach is that of 'conversion factors' that play a positive or negative role in the 'translation' from a resource into a capability. The first specialized publication on the capability approach and technology, more specifically on Information and communications technology (ICT), already appear at the end of the 1990s. The core claim of the capability approach is that people's 'freedom to achieve well-being is of primary moral importance'. For some of these capabilities, the main input will be financial resources and economic production, but for others it can also be political practices and institutions, such as the effective guaranteeing and protection of freedom of thought, political participation, social or cultural practices, social structures, social institutions, public goods, social norms, traditions and habits.