Socio-technical Networks Research Articles

Tecnologias, infraestruturas e redes feministas: potências no processo de ruptura com o legado colonial e androcêntrico*

Resumo Autonomia, linguagem e segurança são as três categorias fundamentais que neste artigo desvelam a noção de tecnologia feminista que vem sendo construída em movimentos feministas da América Latina. Os diferentes sentidos mobilizados nessas categorias são observados a partir da atuação de coletivas latino-americanas de mulheres, pessoas trans e não binárias voltadas para produção e uso das tecnologias de informação e comunicação, redes autônomas e infraestruturas. Nesse cenário, tecnologia feminista é uma perspectiva construída por esses movimentos engajados em um debate tecnopolítico na interface com conhecimentos sobre internet, autonomia, infraestruturas digitais e segurança da informação para ativistas. A partir de pesquisas recentes desenvolvidas pelas autoras, este artigo apresenta e analisa a constituição dessa perspectiva e sua contribuição para a construção de alianças com as tecnologias e redes sociotécnicas que sejam divergentes do legado colonial e androcêntrico.

Skills required to deliver energy efficient school retrofit buildings

PurposeThe prevailing literature argues the need for “new” skills to deliver energy-efficient buildings. The concept of new skills, however, has not been subject to empirical investigation. This paper aims to provide insight on the required new skills, and their development and application, for the successful delivery of energy-efficient school retrofit buildings.Design/methodology/approachThe research employed a case study approach of a school retrofit building project in the early stages of the adoption of energy-efficient measures. Through the application of the socio-technical network approach (STNA) as the data collection and analysis framework, data were collected through semi-structured interviews, observations and a review of relevant organisational documentation and were analysed using thematic coding.FindingsThe findings reveal key actors (i.e. the local authority, energy contractors and school end-users), their principal interests and the required communication, project management, energy management, technical and research skills during their interactions in the successful delivery of the school retrofit building project. The results further reinforce the crucial role of the local authority in driving energy performance improvement of school buildings.Originality/valueThis study demonstrates empirical evidence of the principal actors and skills required for the delivery of energy-efficient school retrofit buildings, contributes to new theoretical insights at the identification of key micro-level development of construction skills through the project network and evidences on how the STNA can be mobilised in construction skills research.

Towards a socio-technical understanding of discretion: a case study of Taser and police use of force

ABSTRACT Using a case study of the ‘less lethal’ electric-shock weapon the Taser in English and Welsh policing, this article argues that the notion of discretion as an arena in which police officers are able to exercise free will can be overstated. Drawing on insights from Science and Technology Studies, it is argued that discretionary decisions may well be structured not only by the human agency but also by the presence and agency of nonhumans and the socio-technical networks within which they are embedded. Whilst existing work has recognised the human and societal influences impacting officer decision making, this article draws on Science and Technology Studies to argue there are merits to a distinctly socio-technical approach to discretion. Broader implications for discretion by police officers and other ‘street level bureaucrats’, for STS and criminology and for policies around Taser are also discussed.

Re-assembling automobility: bicycle helmets and the risks of cycling in the US, 1970-1995

ABSTRACTTraffic safety conceptions are often analysed as subordinated to automobility, but how this occurs remains vague. I examine the emergence and spread of accounts of the risks of cycling in the US and their domination by head injuries and bicycle helmets, a framing often attributed to automobility. I trace the sociotechnical network producing these accounts using academic and governmental publications, the mass media, and interviews. I demonstrate that the emergence and spread of traffic safety conceptions are non-linear and contingent, highlight the constitutive role of non-humans in these processes, and argue against the use of automobility to explain such developments.

Explosive phenomena in complex networks

The emergence of large-scale connectivity and synchronization are crucial to the structure, function and failure of many complex socio-technical networks. Thus, there is great interest in analyzing phase transitions to large-scale connectivity and to global synchronization, including how to enhance or delay the onset. These phenomena are traditionally studied as second-order phase transitions where, at the critical threshold, the order parameter increases rapidly but continuously. In 2009, an extremely abrupt transition was found for a network growth process where links compete for addition in attempt to delay percolation. This observation of "explosive percolation" was ultimately revealed to be a continuous transition in the thermodynamic limit, yet with very atypical finite-size scaling, and it started a surge of work on explosive phenomena and their consequences. Many related models are now shown to yield discontinuous percolation transitions and even hybrid transitions. Explosive percolation enables many other features such as multiple giant components, modular structures, discrete scale invariance and non-self-averaging, relating to properties found in many real phenomena such as explosive epidemics, electric breakdowns and the emergence of molecular life. Models of explosive synchronization provide an analytic framework for the dynamics of abrupt transitions and reveal the interplay between the distribution in natural frequencies and the network structure, with applications ranging from epileptic seizures to waking from anesthesia. Here we review the vast literature on explosive phenomena and synthesize the fundamental connections between models and survey the application areas. We attempt to classify explosive phenomena based on underlying mechanisms and to provide a coherent overview and perspective for future research to address the many vital questions that remained unanswered.

Perspectives on algorithmic normativities: engineers, objects, activities

This contribution aims at proposing a framework for articulating different kinds of “normativities” that are and can be attributed to “algorithmic systems.” The technical normativity manifests itself through the lineage of technical objects. The norm expresses a technical scheme’s becoming as it mutates through, but also resists, inventions. The genealogy of neural networks shall provide a powerful illustration of this dynamic by engaging with their concrete functioning as well as their unsuspected potentialities. The socio-technical normativity accounts for the manners in which engineers, as actors folded into socio-technical networks, willingly or unwittingly, infuse technical objects with values materialized in the system. Surveillance systems’ design will serve here to instantiate the ongoing mediation through which algorithmic systems are endowed with specific capacities. The behavioral normativity is the normative activity, in which both organic and mechanical behaviors are actively participating, undoing the identification of machines with “norm following,” and organisms with “norminstitution”. This proposition productively accounts for the singularity of machine learning algorithms, explored here through the case of recommender systems. The paper will provide substantial discussions of the notions of “normative” by cutting across history and philosophy of science, legal, and critical theory, as well as “algorithmics,” and by confronting our studies led in engineering laboratories with critical algorithm studies.

In search of the Smart Citizen: Republican and cybernetic citizenship in the smart city

The smart city has been both celebrated for opening up decision-making processes through responsive digital infrastructures, and criticised for turning citizens into mere nodes of socio-technical networks under corporate or government control. In line with these depictions, smart city politics is often analysed as a struggle between aspirations for bottom-up participatory democracy and authoritarian control. Drawing on ethnographic research on an Amsterdam project which encourages citizens to collect and share air quality data, we problematise this vertical reading of smart city politics. The project mobilises both republican citizenship and cybernetic citizenship, each assuming different logics regarding the ways in which citizens negotiate urban life by means of data and sensing technologies. While republican citizenship emphasises citizens’ sovereignty, cybernetic citizenship emphasises their immersion into informational environments. We demonstrate how, depending on specific situated interests and forms of engagement, both kinds of citizenship feed into appealing visions of urban life for different actors.

Infrastructures of reception: The spatial politics of refuge in Mannheim, Germany

This article investigates the spatial politics at play in the urban reception of refugees by proposing an infrastructural conceptualisation of humanitarian spaces. In doing so, it destabilises the assumption that urban infrastructures form the mere backdrop of humanitarian government by thinking the city as socio-technical networks. By advancing the notion of infrastructures of reception, we draw attention to those parts of urban space that establish relationships between refugees and the cities that host them. Thus, building on ethnographic material collected in and around a state-managed reception centre in Mannheim, Germany, the article advances a critical reading of the universal, humanitarian gestures the German state has employed towards refugees since 2015, juxtaposing the state's rhetoric with the actual spaces of refuge. An attention to the situated materiality of the reception centre and its policy framework exposes on one hand that Mannheim's reception gesture towards refugees was the outcome of risk-benefit calculations, and on the other that its spatiality contributes to its residents' immobility, containment and suspension. Ultimately, the article argues that an infrastructural approach to urban reception practices offers a pertinent theoretical and methodological tool to uncover its political trajectories through highlighting the refugee centre's ambivalent relationship with the city.

Among people and artifacts: Actor-Network Theory and the adoption of solar ice machines in the Brazilian Amazon

Using Actor-Network Theory, this article analyzes the process by which a solar-powered food storage technology was implemented in an isolated floodplain community in the Brazilian Amazon (Amazonas state, Brazil), as part of the Solar Ice Project headed by the Mamirauá Institute for Sustainable Development. Our study describes the sociotechnical network that entangles the human and nonhuman actors involved in this initiative and reflects on the complexity of the implementation process. Our discussion seeks to identify elements not generally considered in analyses of Social Technologies used in local development initiatives based on technological innovations. Data on the engineering, use, operation, and adaptation of Solar Ice Machines highlight the need to promote fluid technologies capable of adapting to the different contexts within which they are inserted.

Perspective of the Actor-Network Approach on Studies about Water

Current struggles related to water access and control require modifying how heterogeneous connections that water establishes with diverse technical, social and natural processes during its circulation are studied. Actor-network theory is a useful approach to this kind of analysis since it allows the researcher to observe the reality as a network of relationships among human and non-human actors. The use of this approach in studies about water is still relatively scarce, and its application may seem a bit difficult and abstract to those who are starting to adopt it. The aim of this work is to provide a methodological and conceptual background to researchers and students on the use of the actor-network theory in studies about water. The information extracted from the analysis of 13 studies included methodological aspects and descriptions of socio-technical networks deployed through urban or rural infrastructure, regulatory frameworks, and contractual arrangements. In conclusion, the studies allowed the visualization of the main interactions of analysis employed to follow actants and to examine their inscriptions in the hydrosocial networks.

Devicing future populations: Problematizing the relationship between quantity and quality of life

Taking as point of departure the claim that, in late modern societies, there has been shift from a focus on producing measures of life and death towards metrics of health and disability, this paper investigates how, through what means and processes was this transition achieved. It proposes that such questions can be addressed by analysing the transcripts and sociotechnical network of a meeting held at the United States Senate on July 15th 1983 to assess the validity and sensitivity of life expectancy forecasts. The paper analyses how members of the Hearing transformed a weakly articulated set of differing life expectancy projections into a controversy about the issue of vitality and health in populations. Analysis of the Hearing proceedings suggests that 'calculative devices' played a generative role in problematizing the relationship between forms of expertise, calculative procedures, data infrastructures and specific expectations of the effect of technology on health and longevity. The paper details empirically that this re-composition was possible through a collective investigation - an opening up - of key instruments in the management of populations in 'insurance societies'.

Investigations into Data Ecosystems: a systematic mapping study

Data Ecosystems are socio-technical complex networks in which actors interact and collaborate with each other to find, archive, publish, consume, or reuse data as well as to foster innovation, create value, and support new businesses. While the Data Ecosystem field is thus arguably gaining in importance, research on this subject is still in its early stages of development. Up until now, not many academic papers related to Data Ecosystems have been published. Furthermore, to the best of our knowledge, there has been no systematic review of the literature on Data Ecosystems. In this study, we provide an overview of the current literature on Data Ecosystems by conducting a systematic mapping study. This study is intended to function as a snapshot of the research in the field and by doing so identifies the different definitions of Data Ecosystem and analyzes the evolution of Data Ecosystem research. The studies selected have been classified into categories related to the study method, contribution, research topic, and ecosystem domains. Finally, we analyze how Data Ecosystems are structured and organized, and what benefits can be expected from Data Ecosystems and what their limitations are.

Innovación tecnológica en un caso de agricultura protegida en México

El objetivo de esta investigación fue analizar el cambio tecnológico e innovación, la forma de cómo se transmite la tecnología y las redes vinculadas a la agricultura protegida desde un enfoque territorial en el estado de Hidalgo, México. Para su análisis se utilizó la trayectoria tecnológica, el método genealógico y las redes sociotécnicas. Los resultados indican que la trayectoria se dio mediante la acumulación de cambios tecnológicos, impulsados por las políticas de fomento. Las genealogías muestran que la tecnología se introduce, adapta y reproduce por agentes innovadores que mantienen relación con universidades e instituciones públicas. Las redes sociotécnicas se caracterizan por su amplitud, heterogeneidad y clara articulación entre actores; destacan los extensionistas que se encargan de la mediación y armonización de procesos y de la creación de vínculos y relaciones entre los actores. La especialización regional fue la clave para el desarrollo de la agricultura protegida, sin embargo, es necesario diversificar productos, explorar nuevos mercados y gestionar la organización. Finalmente, el enfoque analítico utilizado permite comprender el cambio tecnológico e innovación en los sistemas de producción agrícola, cambio tecnológico, método genealógico, redes sociotécnicas y trayectoria tecnológica.

Assembling narratives: Tensions in collaborative construction of knowledge

Scientific and scholarly research is heterogeneous in that divergent viewpoints, and different interests must be brought together to achieve coherent accounts of research. The tensions caused by this multiplicity of interests and singularity of output frame most collaborative research practice. The goal of present study is to identify areas of tension in such collaborative and heterogeneous efforts. To this end, the present study investigates the co‐construction of archeological narrative at one of the largest multinational archeological campaigns in the world, the Çatalhöyük project in Turkey. This study conceptualizes archeological narratives as epistemic assemblages. Following Actor Network theorists, the archeological process is conceptualized as a series of translation processes (of heterogeneous engineering) that inscribe the found material remains of archeological investigation into a narrative. This complex process takes place within a heterogeneous sociotechnical network. This study decomposes this heterogeneous network to identify the areas of tension and struggle. Two sources of such tensions are identified as fragmentation and fault lines. Overcoming fragmentation and fault lines is key for the success of heterogeneous scientific work and maintaining productive scientific collaboration. The findings of this study have applications beyond archeology and can inform the design of cyberinfrastructure for heterogeneous collaborations.

A não-modernidade de Bruno Latour e suas implicações para a Educação em Ciências

Neste trabalho propomos a visão não moderna de Bruno Latour como referencial teórico para fundamentar a Educação em Ciências. Apresentamos os conceitos basilares de sua teoria, partindo da Antropologia Simétrica e suas implicações ontológicas. À luz de conceitos como híbridos, redes, mediação e purificação, explicamos o seu posicionamento “não moderno” e interpretamos conclusões polêmicas de A Vida de Laboratório. Trazemos, por fim, uma discussão sobre implicações da visão de Latour para a área da Educação em Ciências, sugerindo quatro pontos principais: a abordagem da ciência em ação, a preocupação com o processo de formação das teorias científicas e não somente a apresentação das teorias “prontas”, a problematização das redes sociotécnicas e a formação de uma comunidade de leitores escritores.

Social media and the trajectory of the “20 Cents Movement” in Brazil: An Actor-Network Theory-based investigation

This study sets out to analyze the trajectory of the popular demonstrations that occurred in Brazil in June 2013, commonly known as the “20 Cents Movement,” in order to understand their relationship to the use of social media. Thus, using Actor-Network Theory (ANT) associated with a single case study, the relevant actors in the formation of a socio-technical network resulting in the popular demonstrations that occurred in Brazil were identified. The study reveals that these demonstrations were comprised of different actors aligned around a single obligatory passage point, namely the social media. It was established that social media played an important role in this popular demonstration, prompting a change in the way citizens interact and unite, making formal organizations less necessary, and broadening the political participation of society. Nevertheless, the misalignment between the global and local network of actors led this uprising to fade out over time. Lastly, implications for practice and theory accrued from the investigation of this social media-enabled movement are set forth.

Simulation based assessment of resilience of two large-scale socio-technical IT networks

Most sectors of modern society are currently undergoing rapid digitalization. With the progress of this development IT networks are becoming an ever more crucial asset whose failure are prone to cause economic losses and risks to health and safety of the population. Due to this development, it is increasingly important that IT networks are designed to be resilient, meaning that they either maintain or quickly recover their functionality when exposed to strains of various kinds. Simulation-based methods that consider supply network topology as well as system for repairing the supply network have previously been applied and found to be useful for assessment of resilience of electricity and water networks. A method of this kind is here applied for IT networks. The method, however, considers only hardware and operator fault modes, not software and dependency faults. The IT networks are studied as socio-technical systems, here broadly understood as systems whose functionality depend on technical as well as organizational sub-systems. The aim of the present paper is to investigate if the method is applicable for assessment of resilience of large-scale IT networks that are critical to society, meaning that (1) it is possible to apply for such systems based on available data, in this case gathered mainly through interviews with focus groups, (2) the results are relevant for users/maintainers/owners of these systems and (3) it captures all relevant factors. The method is tested in case studies on the IT network of a municipality and the SCADA system of a wastewater network. Follow-up interviews were conducted with system managers to assess the perceived relevance of the method and results. It is concluded that the method can be used to obtain the resilience metrics sought for and that the method enables system owners to see if and for what levels of strain they are presently reaching their desired targets concerning system resilience. Follow-up interviews also indicate that the method is perceived by the system managers as being able to support decision making concerning improvement in system resilience.

Anticipating Constraints on Upscaling from Urban Innovation Experiments

The upscaling of innovations from urban experiments is often assumed to be relatively easy, as if they can simply be ‘rolled out’. In practice, however, upscaling is usually constrained by a range of factors in the wider context of the innovation, typically a context of interconnected and ‘obdurate’ urban socio-technical networks and institutions. Innovation studies have used the notion of upscaling from experiments most explicitly in studies of transitions, especially of strategic niche management (SNM) and transition management (TM). However, these studies have focused more on niche internal dynamics and future visions, respectively, and much less on constraints in the present socio-institutional context. This paper offers a conceptual contribution on ‘constraints on upscaling’, elaborating on how upscaling can be more effective when constraints on upscaling are first identified in retrospective systems analysis, and then anticipated in the design of urban experiments. Our focus is on innovation in urban mobility systems. After a conceptualization of ‘constraints on upscaling’, based on a review of the literature of transition, social innovation, geography and science & technology studies, we present a retrospective analysis of urban mobility in Maastricht (NL) in which these interrelated constraints can be recognized. Further, we analyze a pilot on electric bus mobility which was relatively successful in anticipating future constraints. Based on this, we offer some guidelines on how to anticipate upscaling in the design of urban experiments with socio-technical innovations.

Intervista a Bruno Latour

Bruno Latour is a renowned author whose works have influenced all branches of social sciences in the last thirty years. After his path-breaking ethnographies of scientific laboratories and the development, alongside M. Callon, of Actor-Network-Theory, his recent works focus mainly on political ecology and the issue of global warming. In this interview, we have asked Latour to retrace the path that, following a more linear trajectory than one might expect, brought him from the sociology of scientific knowledge to deal with political ecology.According to Latour, the concerns that stood at the core of his works on science and technology can provide deeper insights into the politics of climate change. What geologists have recently named as the “Anthropocene” (that is, our current geological era marked by anthropogenic climate change) is a hybrid entity just like the socio-technical networks he had described in Laboratory Life and Science in Action. Only by developing a social science that is hospitable to non-human entities is it possible to imagine a way to deal politically with environmental issues.The ecological crisis calls for a readjustment of political affects similar to the one that was brought about by the social question between XIX and XX centuries, that is, one that entails an alliance between social sciences, politics, science, and arts. Latour’s own recent work, by engaging in collaborations with both scientists and artists, points in this direction.

Cultural Techniques and the Politics of Detail: Tom McCarthy’sRemainderand/as Media Theory

AbstractTom McCarthy’s novels are informed by media theory, and this essay reads his novelRemaindernot onlywiththeory in order to highlight parallels to reflections on cultural techniques and sociotechnical networks but also tries to assess its relevanceastheory. My essay will, first of all, introduce the media theoretical framework of cultural techniques and show how cultural techniques are described inRemainder.The parallel agendas of the novel and cultural techniques research, I argue, converge in a shared interest in materiality, practices, and the seemingly banal details of everyday life but put them into different perspectives. I will then readRemainderas a contribution to the theoretical debate on cultural techniques and suggest that the novel draws our attention to a politics of detail in theories of practices, the everyday, and cultural techniques.