Cowan Coventry is the chief executive of the Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG). He was head of the overseas programme at the Catholic Institute for International Relations (CIIR) and director of the Latin America/Caribbean region at Oxfam, and worked for Britain’s department for international development (DfID) on the relationship between civil society and poverty reduction.

Recent articles

The promise of micro-technology as a tool of social progress is balanced by fear of its use to reduce freedom and widen global divisions. The benign if flawed vision of E.F. Schumacher still holds lessons for how a better social application of science can serve the interests of the world’s poor and the planet’s sustainability.