Neurotechnology in Africa: A Scoping Review

Global research in, policy for, and applications of neurotechnology in the age of the fourth industrial revolution are expanding. A handful of international initiatives are collaborating on structuring considerations of neurorights, neural security, and data autonomy of neurotechnology (Bianchi et al., 2018; Greely et al., 2018) into guidelines, with a shared priority of upholding neuroethics integrity in neurotechnological acceleration. Yet, international perspectives on ethical frameworks frequently decenter the input of the Global Majority (Palk, 2022; Robertson et al., 2025). There are hundreds of cultural practices, healthcare systems, and political infrastructures in Africa which can participate meaningfully in building neurotechnology governance frameworks that are socially sensitive and locally implementable. We consider that the success of these frameworks will depend on their relevance for African contexts, in at least three spheres: ethics of neurotechnology, neuroscience of neurotechnology, and governance of neurotechnology. Since there are no unifying articles to date that scope African literature at this intersection, we propose the scoping review of neurotechnology in Africa. We formulate the proposal for the scoping review with the broad questions: what are the foundations of neuroethics in Africa (Matshabane et al., 2024), what are the neuroscientific priorities in Africa (Besharati and Akinyemi, 2023; Donald et al., 2022; Maina et al., 2021) that may look to neurotechnology for solutions now or the near future; and whether policies are currently used (or in development) by African nations to maintain neurotechnological safety. We anticipate that the outcomes of the review will include: - Where in Africa various types of neurotechnologies are applied. - Which types of neurotechnologies are applied in various countries. - What the foundational neuroscientific research focus is, where these technologies are applied (recovery from injury, enhancement, treatment/therapy, curiosity, work, industry and so on). - Whether African governance or policy frameworks have been developed for neurotechnology applications. - Commentary or opinion pieces which advocate for or against particular best practices in neurotechnology research.