Subjektivierung als Artikulation diskursiver Ordnungen: zur Aneignung von Subjektpositionen im Kontext der Entwicklung automatisierter Videoüberwachung

Empirische Studien zeigen immer wieder, wie AkteurInnen regelmäßig von den ihnen zugeschriebenen Subjektpositionen abweichen. Während dies zunächst an sich nicht besonders überraschend sein mag, ergibt sich daraus jedoch die Frage, wie sich diese Abweichungen diskurstheoretisch konzeptualisieren lassen, wie sich Unterschiede in den Aneignungsweisen von Subjektpositionen verstehen lassen und wie deren Analyse methodisch umgesetzt werden kann. Wir zeigen, dass Aneignungsweisen von Subjektpositionen mit Stuart Hall als Artikulationen miteinander konkurrierender Diskurse konzipiert werden können. Am Beispiel der Entwicklung automatisierter Videoüberwachung illustrieren wir dann, wie sich Artikulationen empirisch analysieren lassen, und diskutieren abschließend den analytischen Gewinn des Konzepts sowie weiterführende Fragen

Algorithmic IF … THEN rules and the conditions and consequences of power

The introduction to this special issue suggests we need to develop ‘a greater understanding of what might be thought of as the social power of algorithms'. In this paper, ‘social power’ will be critically scrutinised through a study of the entanglement of algorithmic rules with contemporary video-based surveillance technologies. The paper will begin with an analysis of algorithmic ‘IF … THEN’ rules and the conditions (IF) and consequences (THEN) that need to be accomplished for an algorithm to be said to succeed. The work of achieving conditions and consequences demonstrates that the form of ‘power’ in focus is not solely attributable to the algorithm as such, but operates through distributed agency and can be noted as a network effect. That is, the conditions and consequences of algorithmic rules only come into being through the careful plaiting of relatively unstable associations of people, things, processes, documents and resources. From this we can say that power is not primarily social in the sense that algorithms alone create an impact on society, but social in the sense of power being derived through algorithmic associations. The paper argues that this kind of power is most clearly visible in moments of breakdown, failure or other forms of trouble, whereby algorithmic conditions and consequences are not met and the careful plaiting of associations has to be brought to the fore and examined. It is through such examinations that the associational dependencies more than the social power of algorithms are made apparent

Intelligente Videoüberwachung: eine Handreichung

6 MuViT ist ein von Mai 2010 bis September 2013 vom Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung im Rahmen des Programms für zivile Sicherheitsforschung für drei Jahre gefördertes Verbundprojekt. Ziel dieses Verbundes war es, mehrere technische Projekte beim Prozess der Entwicklung von Mustererkennungs- oder Video Tracking- Techniken zu begleiten. MuViT war an vier Universitäten beheimatet und integriert Perspektiven aus der Sozialpsychologie, Soziologie, Ethik und Rechtswissenschaft

The Mundane Politics of ‘Security Research’: Tailoring Research Problems

Since the late 20th century, Germany’s federal science policy has shifted towards an emphasis on commercialization and/or applicability of academic research. University researchers working within such strategic funding schemes then have to balance commitments to their government commission, their research, and their academic careers, which can often be at odds with each other. Drawing on an ethnographic study of the development of a ‘smart’ video surveillance system, I analyze some of the strategies which have helped a government-funded, transdisciplinary group of researchers to navigate conflicting expectations from their government, academia, and the wider public in their everyday work. To varying degrees, they managed to align conflicting expectations from the government and their departments by tailoring research problems which were able to travel across different social worlds. By drawing attention to work practices ‘on the ground’, this article contributes ethnographic detail to the question of how researchers construct scientific problems under pressures to make their work relevant for societal and commercial purposes