IS 376 Resisting Technology: Issues and Effects

1. IS 376Resisting Technology: Issues and Effects Dr. Kapatamoyo 09/12/2013

2. Technology Determinism • Technological determinists view technology • as an autonomous force, • beyond direct human control, and • as the prime cause of social change (Chandler, 1995). • Determinists view the expansion of technology as • Discontinuous, • Technological growth not as a gradual, evolutionary process, but as a series of revolutionary leaps forward (McCormack, 1994). • Determinists commonly have either a radically utopian or radically dystopian opinion on technology (Kaplan, 1996).

3. Utopia vs. Dystopia • Utopian determinists believe that technology is • a positive and uplifting force that will, over time, mitigate or eliminate most or all of the ills that afflict humanity. • That technology is leading society towards an ever more utopian existence. • Dystopian determinists believe • that technology is an inherently evil, or dehumanizing, force that will lead, inevitably, to the moral, intellectual, or physical destruction of humankind

4. Dystopia Cases

5. The Hacker • A hacker is ”a person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities" and one who is capable of "creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations”.

6. The Hacker Ethic • The hacker ethic formulated by Steven Levy in his 1984 book "Hackers: Heroes of the Computer Revolution" outlines the hacker tenets: • Access to computers should be unlimited and Total. • All information should be free. • Mistrust authority - promote decentralization. • Hackers should be judged by their hacking not bogus criteria such as degrees, age, race, or position. • You create art and beauty on a computer. • Computers can change your life for the better.

7. Trespass, Unauthorized Access and Hacktivism • Neil Patrick and six Milwaukee teenagers (1983) called the 414s. • Convicted of computer trespassing • Claimed “we were just playing a game.” • The “Game” involved hacking into Los Alamos National Laboratory and the Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NY • Neil Patrick testified in US Congress. Laws against computer crimes where then created. • Many people do not see an exact parallel between trespassing on a computer system and physical trespass.

8. Hacktivism • Hacktivism: • A fusion of politics and activism. • A policy of hacking, phreaking or creating technology to achieve a political or social goal. • “Forges conscience with technology and girds us against the disagreeable nature of conflict. It allows us to mount better arguments, rally unseen allies, and take on any tyranny” (by Oxblood Ruffin of the Cult of the Dead Cow).

9. What is CyberActivism? • Use of ICTs, e.g. e-mail, list-serv, and the Web, by individuals and groups to • Communicate with large audiences, • Galvanizing individuals around a specific issue or set of issues • And attempt to build solidarity towards meaningful collective actions.

10. Origins • Changes in patterns of information, knowledge, and cultural production are changing • The way information and knowledge are made available can either limit or enlarge the ways people can create and express themselves.

11. Observed Outcomes • Successful outcomes transform existing structures of • Cultural, • Economic, and • Political power

12. Success or Failure • Success is not measured in terms of the achievement of absolute concrete goals or concessions from those in power, but rather a transformation of consciousness and a source of moral vision and voice.

13. Reach • The Web is capacious enough to accommodate protests with more elongated timelines. • The Web intensifiesthe Internet’s non-hierarchical structure. • Can mobilize globally. • Web protests are more efficient than text and e-mail based protests.

14. New Social Movements • Accompanying the emergence of “post-industrial” societies, in which advanced technology and service-based economies are centrifugal, has been the rise of “new” social movements (NSMs). • based on identity-issues and operate at the grassroots level. • consist of networks of relations between a plurality of actors, a sense of collective identity, and shared conflictual issues.

15. New Social Movements • Because the ties between new social movement actors are flexible, participants are able to reach wide and heterogeneous audiences that can organize from different angles to form broad coalitions across various movement domains.

16. New Social Movements • Groups that are marginal and blocked by the prevailing institutions can link together and cooperate in ways that transcend these institutions. • Such movements create “subversive invisible connections across state boundaries and the established channels between them…these interstitial networks translate human goals into organizational means”.

17. Framing • Frames are ways of packaging and presenting ideas and are used as a source of persuasive communication to convince others to join a particular struggle (McAdam, 1996). • To mobilize support, organizers must create simple and concise yet broad movement goals to attract diverse constituencies – an organizing strategy characterized by a “master frame” (Snow and Benford, 1992; Benford, 1993).

18. Framing • Gamson, (1992): for a frame to go from understanding to motivating action it must have the elements of injustice, identity and agency. • Framing helps explain • the articulation of grievances, • the dynamics of recruitment and mobilization, and • the maintenance of solidarity and collective identity.

19. Framing • Acting collectively requires the development of solidarity and an oppositional consciousness that allows a challenging group to identify common injustices, to oppose those injustices, and to define a shared interest in opposing the dominant group or resisting the system of authority responsible for those injustices (Taylor and Van Dyke, 2003)

20. Social Movement Theory • Social movement theory is an interdisciplinary study within the social sciences that generally seeks to explain why social mobilization occurs, the forms under which it manifests, as well as potential social, cultural, and political consequences. • More recently, the study of social movements has been subsumed under the study of contentious politics (e.g. environment, new technology, political economy).

21. Social Movement Theory • Social movement theory recognizes the implications of globalizing trends and how they affect collective action. • One defining feature of the growing number of transnational movements is that they tend to frame, interpret, and attribute their grievances to global issues, including global standards of justice.