Making space with data: Data politics, statistics and urban governance in Denmark

In this article we engage with the contemporary data moment by exploring how particular data practices – consisting of census data and statistics - have become embroiled in the making of urban space and governance in Denmark. By focusing on the controversial case of Danish “ghettos” - a state-sanctioned list of marginalised urban areas– we show how Danish data practices of routinely collecting and aggregating extensive census data have become central to ascribing particular urban neighbourhoods as ghetto areas. These data practices spatialise residential housing areas as problematic and influence Danish urban governance. We explore how new forms of data practices for monitoring urban areas arise, and argue that these practices help to maintain the spatialisation of the “ghetto list”. They do so by drawing multiple forms of data together, that visualise and monitor “at risk” areas making them governable and amenable to physical changes. Finally, we show how the state uses data practices to make citizens (and municipalities) accountable; yet, this accountability cuts both ways, as citizens and municipalities also use data to hold the state accountable. We end with a discussion of how our analysis of data practices has implications for how we imagine the scalar hierarchy of the state and the politics of data

Encounters between social work and STS

From the introduction: This special issue was motivated by a series of productive ‘encounters’ between a diverse group of researchers and practitioners working in and between the fields of social work and STS - most notably the ‘Introducing STS and Social Work’ sessions at the Danish STS conference in 2016

Performance management i en krisetid

This article critically examines perfor- mance management. Performance management is an overall trend in manage- ment that focuses on Key Performance Indicators, generating and utilizing knowledge about the performance of employees in or- der to generate constant organizational performance and improvement. In the article we examine whether performance management is an effective management discipline in our contemporary times. We argue that our contemporary times after the financial crisis are more complex and filled with ambiguities than ever. In order to practice effective organizational leadership, this means that leaders must be able to navigate in and handle increasingly complex realities. Based on a theoretical discussion, exemplified by empirical materials, we argue that the performance management objectives of control, management and learning must be well-balanced and skillfully implemented in organizational practices for this discipline to actually support individual and organizational high-performance in times of complexity and ambiguity.Denne artikel undersøger, om 'performance management'-eller på dansk præstationsledelse— er et effektivt svar på de udfordringer, som organisationer står overfor i krisetider. I tiden efter finanskrisen i september 2008 er det blevet endnu mere relevant for ledere at kunne navigere i en brydningsfyldt krisetid, hvor fast grund under fødderne er svær at finde. I artiklen argumenteres for, at ledelse i en sådan krisetid godt kan drage inspiration fra præstationsledelsesparadigmet og dets fokus på styring, kontrol og læring, men kun hvis lederne formår at integrere og balancere netop styring, kontrol og læring