WASHINGTON — Alec Ross is bringing the State Department a new set of diplomatic tools, including Facebook, text messaging and YouTube. Ross is a senior adviser on innovation to Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton — a role created for the 37-year-old nonprofit leader.
His new job will blend technology with diplomacy in an attempt to help solve some of the globe’s most vexing problems of health care, poverty, human rights and ethnic conflicts.
Projects could include the use of cellphone text messaging as a way to reach isolated communities to warn people of natural disaster or remind patients to take medication. Social networking sites could bring together youth in warring tribes to communicate and organize cultural exchanges. Software could be used to help ensure aid is delivered by creating supply-chain systems.
“I don’t believe tech is an end unto itself to solve problems,” Ross said, “but it can be a critical part of the solution.”
