Is AI Creating a New Form of Digital Colonialism? Ft. Maha Jouini w/Anita Nowak - Purposeful Empathy - Purposeful Empathy with Anita Nowak | Lyssna här

AI is impacting every part of our lives—and we need to start paying more attention.

Watch this important conversation with Maha Jouini, a United Nations independent expert on AI, Human Rights & Technology-Facilitated Gender-Based Violence Prevention and founder of an AI platform that supports women in North Africa living with breast and cervical cancer.

We discuss:

Why AI shouldn’t be shaped by Silicon Valley alone
How AI can reproduce colonial narratives—and why data sovereignty matters
Why we need more AI entrepreneurs building solutions from—and for—the Global South
Why empathy and cultural inclusion must be designed into AI from the start

If you care about AI ethics, digital colonialism, women in AI, human rights, and building technology that represents all of humanity—you don’t want to miss this conversation.

00:00 Preview

01:15 Episode introduction

03:58 About Maha Jouini

07:04 Maha’s backstory

12:04 How cancer changed Maha’s perspective on surveillance and responsible AI

14:10 Why Western assumptions about women’s health don't translate across cultures

21:00 What would AI built on Arab and Islamic ethical frameworks look like?

25:03 Why AI innovation needs culturally diverse voices

28:31 Data sovereignty: Why Africa needs to shape its own AI future

30:54 Digital colonialism: How historical inequality gets embedded into data

34:22 Why the Global South needs greater ownership over its data, technology and digital future

38:18 How a gap in cancer care inspired Maha to build an AI platform for women