Digital Colonialism: Reimagining Power, Identity, and Resistance by Decolonizing AI

Abstract

This paper deals with the convergence of AI and postcolonial studies. Instead, it interrogates how the means of AI development reproduce the old colonial ideologies in the contemporary time. To put it in the words of Said's 'Orientalism,' AI, which the West uses to further impose its inequalities globally, especially against prejudice inherent in machinery and algorithm models, is a result or/and a tool of imperialism derived from colonial philosophies. Bhabha’s notions of hybridity and the third space offer a way to explore the potential of AI as a site for resistance and the re-imagining of postcolonial futures, questioning whether AI could become a space for subverting colonial legacies. Meanwhile, Spivak’s critique of Western epistemologies and her concept of the subaltern underscores the risks of marginalizing voices and experiences in the development of AI systems, which are often dominated by Western, predominantly white, technocratic elites. Therefore, the ideas of these postcolonial theorists provide an important framework for understanding AI as a tool that not only reproduces historical power imbalances but also reshapes contemporary forms of domination. Drawing on these theorists, this paper explores how AI systems—often developed in the Global North—are implicated in processes of digital colonialism, reinforcing surveillance, data extraction, and economic exploitation in postcolonial societies. At the same time, it demands decoloniality for AI through voices. It needs to be centered in the Global South, favor ethical, inclusive technology, and, as such, deconstruct the power dynamics of colonial histories into emergent futures.