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The EthicsLab at the University of Cape Town (UCT) is calling on researchers, creatives, and professionals to become part of an expanding network of individuals engaged in exploring the moral dilemmas raised by new health technologies through an African lens.

Via residencies, retreats, online seminars, and support grants, this Research Development Programme, backed by Wellcome, provides opportunities to engage with an intellectual community that fosters thoughtful, innovative, and collaborative exploration of technology and ethics.

How does technology ethics appear from an African viewpoint?

At the EthicsLab at UCT, this issue lies at the core of a program that, in the last two years, has evolved into a center for interdisciplinary exploration of the ethical, socio-political, and philosophical aspects of new health technologies in areas like artificial intelligence (AI), neuroscience, and genomics. The initiative unites researchers, artists, and professionals to examine how African humanities can contribute to and reshape global discussions on technology and ethics.

Ethics goes beyond a simple set of guidelines; it represents a framework for considering how we can coexist harmoniously and how our decisions, innovations, and visions impact or hinder the concept of a “good life.” In this context, the ethics of technology explores how our tools and systems influence the conditions of existence: who benefits from them, who gets excluded, and which aspects of care or accountability we prioritize or neglect. It involves being aware of the implications of the technologies we engage with and the future possibilities they create.

Ethics as worldmaking

At the core of the program lies the idea that ethics is about shaping the world. Technologies do not simply affect the future—they play a role in creating the moral, political, and social worlds we currently live in. They can sometimes support existing power structures, while at other times they challenge them. The key question, therefore, is not just what technologies do, but what kinds of worlds they help create and what forms of life we find acceptable or fair within those worlds. In this way, the program views ethical exploration as an act of creativity and accountability, posing the challenge of how we can live with and shape technological futures that enhance rather than harm human and environmental well-being.

Morality, to us, is not a list to check off; it is an ongoing process of creating the world.

Ethics, for us, is not a list to check off; it is a process of creating the world,” stated Professor Jantina de Vries, head of the EthicsLab. “It questions how our technologies and decisions influence the worlds we live in and encourages us to envision and build futures that are fair, compassionate, and supportive of life.

Tracking the complexities of AI

Several retreats held under the program highlight the EthicsLab’s broad and creative approach: “AI as Worldmaking: Colonial Dimensions and Planetary Futures” gathered academics from Africa and Latin America to examine how AI is linked to colonialism and consider its implications for global politics. The event was not solely focused on criticism, but also on exploring diverse perspectives; pinpointing where experiences with AI, colonial history, and global politics in African and Latin American contexts overlap and differ, and leveraging these commonalities to envision forms of solidarity based on shared ethical and political practices that can challenge exploitative technological systems.

“By encouraging thoughtful discussion between African academics and other thinkers from the Global South regarding the pressing matters related to AI, the EthicsLab helps to place African knowledge and ways of knowing at the center of global AI conversations, and to base AI development on the sociotechnical conditions of the continent,” said Dr Yousif Hassan from the University of Michigan.

More importantly, the EthicsLab ensures that African intellectual traditions are seen not as minor viewpoints, but as essential to current conversations about AI governance and ethical systems.

Collaborating with the team has been empowering, particularly when considering imagination and ethics in connection to AI and their implications for people in Africa and the Global South.

“AI and the Imagination” brought together literary scholars, artists, and writers to examine how AI influences creativity and artistic expression. The retreat explored the conceptual changes that AI brings to notions of originality, authorship, and authenticity, viewing storytelling and creative processes as areas where ethics is already present. Instead of regarding ethics as external rules or structures, participants discussed how it exists within acts of imagination and artistic decisions, and how AI could challenge or alter this internal ethical landscape.

I have valued the creative and inquisitive spirit that drives the EthicsLab,” said Dr Mapule Mohulatsi, a lecturer in the Department of English Literary Studies at UCT. “Collaborating with the team has been empowering, particularly when considering imagination and ethics in connection to AI and their implications for people in Africa and the Global South. The issues I have explored through the EthicsLab have been essential to my own research in literary studies and to how I deal with a world where AI, and the ethical perspectives we apply to it, are growing more important.

Pathways for participation

As the program grows, EthicsLab remains open to individuals eager to influence the future of technology ethics from an African viewpoint. Participants can get involved through four main channels:

academic retreats

research residencies

catalyst grants

webinar speaking opportunities.

Every one of these routes encourages cross-disciplinary investigation, artistic involvement, and teamwork beyond boundaries and disciplines. Collectively, they create a welcoming academic community that is involved in ongoing consideration of how new technologies are reshaping the concept of being human.

Applications are accepted continuously until September 30, 2026. There is no specific deadline, and applications will be evaluated as they arrive.

Go to the EthicsLab website to find out more, submit an application, or join future initiatives.

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