Data activism, promoting new forms of civic and political engagement, has emerged as a response to problematic aspects of datafication that include tensions between data openness and data ownership, and asymmetries in terms of data usage and distribution. In this article, we discuss MyData, a data activism initiative originating in Finland, which aims to shape a more sustainable citizen-centric data economy by means of increasing individuals' control of their personal data. Using (...) data gathered during long-term participant-observation in collaborative projects with data activists, we explore the internal tensions of data activism by first outlining two different social imaginaries – technological and socio-critical – within MyData, and then merging them to open practical and analytical space for engaging with the socio-technical futures currently in the making. While the technological imaginary favours data infrastructures as corrective measures, the socio-critical imaginary questions the effectiveness of technological correction. Unpacking them clarifies the kinds of political and social alternatives that different social imaginaries ascribe to the notions underlying data activism, and highlights the need to consider the social structures in play. The more far-reaching goal of our exercise is to provide practical and analytical resources for critical engagement in the context of data activism. By merging technological and socio-critical imaginaries in the work of reimagining governing structures and knowledge practices alongside infrastructural arrangements, scholars can depart from the most obvious forms of critique, influence data activism practice, and formulate data ethics and data futures. (shrink)

As heritage-as-the-already-occurred folds into heritage-in-the-making practices, temporal and spatial fluidity is made more complex by digital mediation and particularly by Big Data. Such liveliness evokes ontological, epistemological and methodological challenges. Drawing on more-than-human theorizing, this article reframes the notion of data-bodies to advance data activist-oriented research in heritage. Focused primarily on women, it examines how their distributed agency and voice with respect to data practices and the makings of heritage could be amplified. I describe three methodological (...) directions, influenced by feminist work in critical data studies, which could be employed by researchers: attuning to and becoming with data, making data physical and changing narratives. From data-bodies to haunted data, performative data curation and mapping data-bodies, and attuning to data streams and re-voicing narratives, this article contributes to discussions of how to engage critically and creatively with the datafication of digital heritage practices, knowings and ontologies. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that there is an urgent need for more empirical research into everyday experiences of living with datafication, something that has not been prioritised in the emerging field of data studies to date. As a result of this absence, the knowledge produced within data studies is not as aligned to the aims of data activism as it might be. Data activism seeks to challenge existing, unequal data power relations and (...) to mobilise data in order to enhance social justice, yet data studies has focused primarily on identifying the former and not on imagining the latter. To build a picture of what more just conditions of datafication might look like, I argue that it is important to take account of everyday experiences of datafication, of what people themselves say would enable them to live better with data and would constitute more just data arrangements, based on their experiences. I explore two possible approaches to this endeavour, both of which suggest the need for a vocabulary of emotions in researching everyday living with data. (shrink)

Investigations of data-centered efforts in advocacy and activism are often cast in terms of a narrative of opposition between grassroots activists working through and with data, and corporations or institutions whose actions data might expose. The boundaries are, however, not so distinct in practice. Indeed, one outcome of successful advocacy efforts for opening big data to the public is that the activists may find themselves drawn into the institutions they critique or view as impediments in (...) order to actualize those efforts from the inside. Drawing on an ongoing ethnographic investigation of urban data initiatives inside city government, we explore the productive ambivalences of activism and advocacy that arise when those with data activist ideals find themselves operating within the government structure. (shrink)

This chapter presents and analyzes data from an international, online Qualtrics survey (2017–2020) collecting data on harassment and discrimination in the anymal activist community. This survey provides data regarding the demography of movement perpetrators, types of harassment/discrimination experienced/witnessed, manifestations of harassment/discrimination, numbers of individuals effected, consequences for perpetrators (lack thereof), and sheds light on the importance of social capital, male networks, need for community (manifest as inside-facing loyalty), and organization policies and reporting.

The Snowden leaks, first published in June 2013, provided unprecedented insights into the operations of state-corporate surveillance, highlighting the extent to which everyday communication is integrated into an extensive regime of control that relies on the ‘datafication’ of social life. Whilst such data-driven forms of governance have significant implications for citizenship and society, resistance to surveillance in the wake of the Snowden leaks has predominantly centred on techno-legal responses relating to the development and use of encryption and policy advocacy (...) around privacy and data protection. Based on in-depth interviews with a range of social justice activists, we argue that there is a significant level of ambiguity around this kind of anti-surveillance resistance in relation to broader activist practices, and critical responses to the Snowden leaks have been confined within particular expert communities. Introducing the notion of ‘data justice’, we therefore go on to make the case that resistance to surveillance needs to be conceptualized on terms that can address the implications of this data-driven form of governance in relation to broader social justice agendas. Such an approach is needed, we suggest, in light of a shift to surveillance capitalism in which the collection, use and analysis of our data increasingly comes to shape the opportunities and possibilities available to us and the kind of society we live in. (shrink)

A recent report from the UN makes the case for “global data literacy” in order to realise the opportunities afforded by the “data revolution”. Here and in many other contexts, data literacy is characterised in terms of a combination of numerical, statistical and technical capacities. In this article, we argue for an expansion of the concept to include not just competencies in reading and working with datasets but also the ability to account for, intervene around and participate (...) in the wider socio-technical infrastructures through which data is created, stored and analysed – which we call “data infrastructure literacy”. We illustrate this notion with examples of “inventive data practice” from previous and ongoing research on open data, online platforms, data journalism and data activism. Drawing on these perspectives, we argue that data literacy initiatives might cultivate sensibilities not only for data science but also for data sociology, data politics as well as wider public engagement with digital data infrastructures. The proposed notion of data infrastructure literacy is intended to make space for collective inquiry, experimentation, imagination and intervention around data in educational programmes and beyond, including how data infrastructures can be challenged, contested, reshaped and repurposed to align with interests and publics other than those originally intended. (shrink)

“Why are millions of dollars worth of orders being left unpaid?”. With tweets like this questioning brands’ policies, activists advocating for sustainable fashion re-discuss material starting points that are assumed by fashion brands, who argue that they are sustainable because they care about their workers’ conditions. This paper argues that activists use tweets to open _subdiscussions on material starting points_ to engage citizens and consumers, re-discussing factual _data_ that brands take for granted, such as the fact that they provide fair (...) conditions for their garment workers. Activists justify their opening of subdiscussions, often through an argumentative pattern that includes an argument based on the _locus from effects to cause_. They argue that if there are negative effects, the brand cannot claim to care about the conditions of its workers. In discussing how subdiscussions are used by fashion activists, this paper also introduces a conceptualization of Twitter argumentation as a discussion that is not isolated, but is part of a polylogical argumentation that takes place in different venues. For this reason, the argumentation used in tweets is reconstructed as a response to a fashion brand’s communication campaigns around sustainability, which extend beyond the confines of Twitter. As an empirical illustration, this paper is based on the campaign targeting fashion retailer Primark; the dataset includes the brand’s website as well as activists’ tweets. (shrink)

This article approaches the paradigm shift of datafication from the perspective of civil society. Looking at how individuals and groups engage with datafication, it complements the notion of “data politics” by exploring what we call the “contentious politics of data”. By contentious politics of data we indicate the bottom-up, transformative initiatives interfering with and/or hijacking dominant processes of datafication, contesting existing power relations or re-appropriating data practices and infrastructure for purposes distinct from the intended. Said contentious (...) politics of data is articulated in an array of practices of data activism taking a critical stance towards datafication. In data activism, data as mediators take a central role, both as part of an action repertoire or as objects of struggle in their own right. Leveraging social movement studies and science and technology studies, this theoretical essay argues that data activism can be mapped along two analytical dimensions: “data as stakes” vs. “data as repertoires”, and “individual practice vs. collective action”. Mapping action repertoires and tactics along these axes allows us to chart the potential emergence of a political data subject at the intersection of these two dimensions. This furthers our understanding of people’s engagement with data in relation to other forms of activism and existing work in social movement studies. It also helps us interpreting potential trajectories of contemporary social movements, as they increasingly interface with data, devices and platforms. (shrink)

If we accept that surveillance by the State and ‘sousveillance’ by the media in Western democracies tend towards a relative equilibrium, or ‘equiveillance’ supported by the function of journalism as a watchdog and that the rule of law largely protects fundamental freedoms, this paper argues that the act of ‘mutual watching’ is undesired by the State and comes at a very high cost to journalists. The combination of technological capacity, legislative change and antidemocratic sentiments of the State, in the context (...) of its willingness and ability to collect and process Big Data on an unprecedented scale, disrupt the preconditions for a strong democracy based on free media and free citizens. This paper examines the politics of investigative journalism under the conditions of dominance of the State by investigating the experiences of journalists with surveillance. Our interviews with 48 journalists show that journalists are acutely aware of surveillance and its noxious impact. Well beyond simple ‘watching’ these experiences are remarkably similar in non-Western and Western countries. Journalists are engaging increasingly with technological and other communities, as they aim to defend journalism and their lives. Their activism is operationalised in three areas: in reluctant often-fraught cooperation with hacktivists, in self-directed protection of communications and sources and in not always willingly acting as dissenters vis-a-vis the State. This paper explores the extent to which journalists consider equilibrium to be distorted, and how they are countering any slide into subdued democracy. (shrink)

Scientific data supporting rational arguments for human-made causes of climate and environmental changes might be persuasive in some contexts. Law, policy, activism and The Earth Charter similarly appear insufficient to change attitudes and behaviours. Even biblical and theological arguments fail to move some Christians beyond apathy and climate denial. Decades of ecological theology and calls for ecological conversion suggest that appeals to reason and facts are limited without an affective epistemology that join knowledge and experience to produce worldview (...) transformation through emotions, such as awe.Contribution: Departing from appeal to scientific data and arguments alone, the primary claim is that ecological conversion is not singularly a rational act. For broader engagement and action to mitigate climate and environmental degradation, experiential and affective encounter with nature promise wider participation and transformation. (shrink)

Brexit activists demonstrating outside the British Houses of Parliament were studied in situ to examine their potential for pro-group extreme behavior. This involved activists of two polarized, opposing views; those of Leave and Remain. The research engaged concepts linking the different theoretical perspectives of identity fusion and personal construct psychology. The study measured participants' degree of fusion to their group using a verbal measure. Willingness to undertake extreme acts was assessed in several ways: a measure of willingness to fight for (...) the group, adaptations of the trolley dilemma and questions regarding political violence. Individual construing was examined using repertory grid technique and a semi-structured interview. Results were similar for both Leave and Remain participants. The majority of activists identified as “fused” to their group and, if so, were more likely to undertake hypothetical extreme behavior compared to those who did not identify as “fused.” Repertory grid technique indicated that becoming an activist provided individuals with a clearer and more positive view of themselves. Opposition activists were construed more negatively and extremely than fellow activists, and this construal was associated with an increased willingness to undertake extreme pro-group behavior. This was consistent with the personal construct model of radicalization and was heightened in those who were “fused.” Interview data provided support for the constructivist model and revealed characteristics and concerns of the two groups. Overall, the findings indicate that campaigning organizations contain fused individuals, who are more likely to undertake hypothetical pro-group violence including self-sacrifice. This has broader implications which may be particularly pertinent, given the violent impact of extremist activists around the globe. (shrink)

This article investigates pro-environmental behaviours and activism focusing on the patterns of environmentally-oriented public behaviours (e.g. civic activities such as signing a petition about an environmental issue, giving money to an environmental group, or taking part in a protest or demonstration about an environmental issue, being a member of an environmental group) as well as environmentally-oriented private behaviours (e.g. sorting glass or tins or plastic or newspapers and so on for recycling, cutting back on driving a car, reducing the (...) energy or fuel you use at home, choosing to save or re-use water and avoiding of buying certain products for environmental reasons). The article is based on data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) module Environment 2010. (shrink)

This article shows how activists in the open data movement re-articulate notions of democracy, participation, and journalism by applying practices and values from open source culture to the creation and use of data. Focusing on the Open Knowledge Foundation Germany and drawing from a combination of interviews and content analysis, it argues that this process leads activists to develop new rationalities around datafication that can support the agency of datafied publics. Three modulations of open source are identified: First, (...) by regarding data as a prerequisite for generating knowledge, activists transform the sharing of source code to include the sharing of raw data. Sharing raw data should break the interpretative monopoly of governments and would allow people to make their own interpretation of data about public issues. Second, activists connect this idea to an open and flexible form of representative democracy by applying the open source model of participation to political participation. Third, activists acknowledge that intermediaries are necessary to make raw data accessible to the public. This leads them to an interest in transforming journalism to become an intermediary in this sense. At the same time, they try to act as intermediaries themselves and develop civic technologies to put their ideas into practice. The article concludes with suggesting that the practices and ideas of open data activists are relevant because they illustrate the connection between datafication and open source culture and help to understand how datafication might support the agency of publics and actors outside big government and big business. (shrink)

Moving away from the strong body of critique of pervasive ‘bad data’ practices by both governments and private actors in the globalized digital economy, this book aims to paint an alternative, more optimistic but still pragmatic picture of the datafied future. The authors examine and propose ‘good data’ practices, values and principles from an interdisciplinary, international perspective. From ideas of data sovereignty and justice, to manifestos for change and calls for activism, this collection opens a multifaceted (...) conversation on the kinds of futures we want to see, and presents concrete steps on how we can start realizing good data in practice. (shrink)

The activism of institutional investors tends more and more toward the supervision and control of the behavior of the managers of big companies. In this article, we present a model based on the creation of an activism index that lets us evaluate such activism’s effect on the sensitivity of the investment policies of a company in the face of financial variables (such as cash flow and liquidity ratio) and market variables (ownership concentration and value creation index). To (...) test our assertions, we analyze firm-level data for United Kingdom (U.K.), Germany, France, Denmark, and Spain during the period 1995–2004. Our results point to a significant reduction in the sensitivity of company investment decisions in the face of these variables, especially relative to intangible capital, as a result of the neutralizing effect of activism on the high agency costs of free cash flow and on the information asymmetries of the market. (shrink)

This study employs online archival and interview methods to understand how people on X (formerly Twitter) interpret and construct the ‘No Gree for Anybody’ tweets as a form of digital protest. ‘No Gree for Anybody,’ translating to ‘Do not compromise for anyone’ in Nigerian Pidgin English, became a sort of national anthem on social media, especially on Twitter, amid the socioeconomic challenges in Nigeria. The adoption of this slogan, despite concerns from the Nigerian Police, underscores its influential role as an (...) alternative protest form advocating systemic reform and confronting entrenched power structures. The qualitative data analysis constructed four key themes: Language and Identity, Digital Protest/Mobilization and Collective Identity, Multiple Symbolism of Defiance, and Protests Continuum in Nigeria’s socio-political landscape. These themes provide a nuanced understanding of ‘No Gree for Anybody’ and how its subtleness and non-episodic features shape digital activism and socio-political discourse in Nigeria, highlighting its position in contemporary protest dynamics. (shrink)

This study provides preliminary empirical evidence that shareholder activists target companies because of their size as well as specific stakeholder-related practices. The data show that shareholder activists target companies with shareholder resolutions demanding changes in corporate behaviors for companies producing problematic products and where environmental concerns exist. Furthermore, companies in specific industries are targeted based on poor employee and community-related practices. Activists, that is, are selective in their targeting of companies, choosing the most visible (largest) companies and those whose (...) practices raise specific issues of interest to society. (shrink)

The popular view of shareholder activism focuses on shareholder resolutions and the shareholder vote via proxy statements at the annual meeting, which is treated as a "David vs. Goliath" showdown between the small group of socially responsible investors and the powerful corporation. This article goes beyond the popular view to examine where the real action typically occurs-in the Dialogue process where corporations and shareholder activist groups mutually agree to ongoing communications to deal with a serious social issue. Use of (...) the capitalized word "Dialogue" is intended to distinguish this formal process between corporations and shareholders from all the other forms of dialogue or twoway communication exchanged between a corporation and its stakeholders. The phenomenon of Dialogue between a corporation and dissident shareholders has not been analyzed in the academic literature or in the popular press because it occurs behind the scenes and out of sight from media scrutiny. Yet this is where a great deal of social change initiated by shareholder activists is negotiated. This article contributes both theoretically and empirically to the study of Dialogues between shareholder activists and corporations. We explain how Dialogues occur in the context of the shareholder resolution process and examine two Dialogues that focus on international labor issues in two industries. Then data on Dialogues during the period, 1999-2005, from the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility are analyzed. This research contributes to knowledge about the Dialogue process and the emerging literature on corporation-stakeholder engagement. (shrink)

To do minor activist research is to create and make use of critical neologistic vocabularies hopefully balancing the ascetic impoverishment of direction and syntax in majority vocabularies when conceptualized as universals. To do minor activist research is therefore to unsettle received discourses, narratives, and material social practices of power to develop means of resistance in new and different registers. To do minor activist research is to train the imagination for a collaboratively accomplished re/presentation of data through creating points of (...) encounters, thus engendering an affirmative perspectivist’s ethos. Re/presenting data as a space in which one’s own thinking is challenged, hence providing a perspective of the storying practices across participants and across different disciplinary, ideological, or personal boundaries within the researcher’s and the researched specific positioning. This requires getting everyone to participate in the “analysis” of data, and then getting everyone “inside” the text: situating data-inquiries in immanence. It therefore demands a liberation from old scripts, and challenges how everyone is transformed into text, with perspectivism being simultaneously means and objective for avoiding the reproduction of both old scripts and ethics. Our goal is to enhance (self)reflexivity regarding knowledge production and research methodologies, to influence actual research practices through fostering a more inclusive, open, and collaborative approach to research that transcends traditional boundaries and embraces the fluid and hybrid nature of knowledge production. Ultimately, turning the concept of ethics through minoring into a thinking hub and pedagogy for change. The first and theoretical section is on how to ethically represent data in a new-empiricist and post qualitative environment. We call it data-philosophy. Our ontological approach brings its own concepts, which reflect the perspectives from which we argue. In the three next sections, we follow up by looking more closely into these ideas in re/presenting empirical qualitative research to invite hybrid and fluid configurations. Here, activist research refers to bringing actors into our thinking about the data, to accentuate the collaborative, open to thinking differently through staying close to the data. We then bring it all together in a section on the rebirth of language, to open for what we refer to as a storying personifying, thereby storying data together as a process of becoming, of mutuality and affect as a source of agency. We argue that this creates a theory of science and ethics in data analysis, and in re/presenting data, which are closely entangled. (shrink)

Controversies about recent killings by police officers in the United States have prompted widespread questioning about the scale and changes in police use of force. A perceived lack of transparency about the frequency of police killings amplifies concerns that many such killings are unjustified. This commentary considers efforts by journalists and activists to comprise databases that document and measure police violence, particularly in terms of how these endeavors exemplify the New Transparency.

We examine whether and when socially oriented shareholder activists use firms’ corporate social performance (CSP) to identify them as attractive targets for their activism. We build on the research in social movements theory and stakeholder theory to theorize how firms’ engagement with primary and secondary stakeholders reflected in their technical and institutional CSP respectively allows socially oriented shareholder activists to identify targets. We develop a theoretical model by identifying corporate targets’ degree of (1) receptivity to and (2) need to (...) comply with activist demands as two key dimensions of their corporate opportunity structure that explains the variance in firms’ attractiveness as targets for activist demands. We show that a firm’s technical and institutional CSP independently affect the likelihood of activists targeting the firm. We also show that our model has greater explanatory power at firms with high resource slack and from activists not identifying as socially responsible investment funds. Analysis of CSP and shareholder proposals data of 992 U.S. public firms over an 8-year window of observation largely supports our theory. (shrink)

This research project investigated the extent to which nurses engage in two important kinds of ethical behaviours: ethical activism (where they try to make hospitals more receptive to nurses’ participation in ethics deliberations) and ethical assertiveness (where they participate in ethics deliberations even when not formally invited). This research probed not only the extent to which nurses engage in these ethical behaviours but also whether this is influenced by professional, training and organizational factors. A random sample of 165 nurses (...) from three major hospitals in Los Angeles provided the data. Regression analyses indicate that both ethical activism and ethical assertiveness are strongly influenced by nurses’ perceptions of the receptivity of hospitals to their inclusion in ethics deliberations. In addition, nurses’ education in ethics is a significant predictor of ethical activism. The findings have important implications for the content of nurses’ ethics training as well as for expanding the boundaries of nurses’ participation in ethics deliberations. The authors define ethics deliberations as specific meetings of a number of people to discuss an ethical issue, such as one regarding the care of a patient. (shrink)

Although the literature on social innovation has focused primarily on social enterprises, social innovation has long occurred within mainstream corporations. Drawing upon recent scholarship on social movements and institutional complexity, we analyze how movements foster corporate social innovation (CSI). Our context is the adoption of green information systems (“green IS”), which are information systems employed to transform organizations and society into more sustainable entities. We trace the historical emergence of green IS as a corporate response to increasing demands for sustainability (...) reporting, a key social innovation that environmental activists helped to create. Drawing upon extensive survey data from more than 400 U.S. firms, we then examine how managers perceived environmental activism in relation to broader field pressures for change and how their perceptions of both were related to green IS adoption. The results reveal that activists were more effective at influencing adoption indirectly by transforming organizational fields than by directly influencing corporate managers. Combined with the historical analysis, these findings suggest that CSI emerged out of ongoing interactions between activists, corporate managers, and other influential actors within a broader social innovation system. Activists helped to create conditions for social innovation, but corporations took the lead in developing new practices. (shrink)

The popular view of shareholder activism focuses on shareholder resolutions and the shareholder vote via proxy statements at the annual meeting, which is treated as a “David vs. Goliath” showdown between the small group of socially responsible investors and the powerful corporation. This article goes beyond the popular view to examine where the real action typically occurs – in the Dialogue process where corporations and shareholder activist groups mutually agree to ongoing communications to deal with a serious social issue. (...) Use of the capitalized word “Dialogue” is intended to distinguish this formal process between corporations and shareholders from all the other forms of dialogue or two-way communication exchanged between a corporation and its stakeholders. The phenomenon of Dialogue between a corporation and dissident shareholders has not been analyzed in the academic literature or in the popular press because it occurs behind the scenes and out of sight from media scrutiny. Yet this is where a great deal of social change initiated by shareholder activists is negotiated. This article contributes both theoretically and empirically to the study of Dialogues between shareholder activists and corporations. We explain how Dialogues occur in the context of the shareholder resolution process and examine two Dialogues that focus on international labor issues in two industries. Then data on Dialogues during the period, 1999–2005, from the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility are analyzed. This research contributes to knowledge about the Dialogue process and the emerging literature on corporation–stakeholder engagement. (shrink)

The present study of the psychology of animal rights activists utilizes a qualitative analytic method based on two forms of data: a set of questionnaire protocols completed by grassroots activists and of autobiographical accounts by movement leaders. The resultant account keys on the following descriptives: an attitude of caring, suffering as an habitual object of perception, and the aggressive and skillful uncovering and investigation of instances of suffering. In a final section, the investigator discusses tensions and conflicts arising from (...) these three themes and various ways of attempting to resolve them. (shrink)

Using a new materialist line of questioning that looks at the agential potentialities of water and its entanglements with Big Data and surveillance, this article explores how the recent Snowden revelations about the National Security Agency have reignited media scholars to engage with the infrastructures that enable intercepting, hosting, and processing immeasurable amounts of data. Focusing on the expansive architecture, location, and resource dependence of the NSA’s Utah Data Center, I demonstrate how surveillance and privacy can never (...) be disconnected from the material infrastructures that allow and render natural the epistemological state of mass surveillance. Specifically, I explore the NSA’s infrastructure and the million of gallons of water it requires daily to cool its servers, while located in one of the driest states in the US. Complicating surveillance beyond the NSA, as also already imbricated with various social media companies, this article questions the emplacement and impact of corporate data centers more generally, and the changes they are causing to the landscape and local economies. I look at how water is an intriguing and politically relevant part of the surveillance infrastructure and how it has been constructed as the main tool for activism in this case, and how it may eventually help transform the public’s conceptualization of Big Data, as deeply material. (shrink)

Women constitute the majority of both the leadership and the membership of local toxic waste activist organizations; yet, gender and the fight against toxic hazards are rarely analyzed together in studies on gender or on environmental issues. This absence of rigorous analysis of gender issues in toxic waste activism is particularly noticeable since many scholars already make note that women predominate in this movement. This article is an attempt to understand how women activists transcend private pain, fear, and disempowerment (...) and become powerful forces for change by organizing against toxic waste in their communities. This article systematically looks at these connections by examining data from survey research and case studies. The authors are particularly interested in the transformation of self of these women, with an emphasis on “ways of knowing.” They also examine the potential of existing social movement theories to explain women's activism against toxic waste. (shrink)

This article explores the links between our roles as academics, advocates, and activists, focusing on our research on treatment decisions for patients in vegetative and minimally conscious states. We describe how our work evolved from personal experience through traditional social science research to public engagement activities and then to advocacy and activism. We reflect on the challenges we faced in navigating the relationship between our research, advocacy, and activism, and the implications of these challenges for our research ethics (...) and methodology—giving practical examples of how we worked with research participants, wrote up case studies and developed interventions into legal debates. We also address the implications of the impact agenda—imposed by the British Research Excellence Framework— for our actions as scholar‐activists. Finally, we ask how practicing at the borders of academia, advocacy, and activism can inform research—helping to contextualize, sensitize, and engage theory with practice, leading to a more robust analysis of data and its implications, and helping to ensure a dialogue between research, theory, lived experience, front‐line practice, law, and public policy. (shrink)

The pathway from scientific knowledge (based on data, models, and forecasts) to societal implications and policy advice is a perilous one. The shift from "is" to "ought" may be slippery in terms of climate, biodiversity, regulations, and business. Yet, what is to be done if one's research discloses that fellow humans are unwittingly carrying out destructive actions on a large scale? If they are unaware of the dynamics within which they are (or are in danger of becoming) imprisoned, is (...) there then not an ethical obligation to respond beyond the scope of one's given role? This dilemma lies at the core of the issue of science-based activism, which the life and work of Jorgen Randers in many ways epitomizes. The best means of understanding science-based activism can be found in exploring Randers' steps, as this festschrift does. [Jorgen Randers (born 1945) co-authored The Limits to Growth in 1972 and its sequels in 1992 and 2004. He is a Professor of Climate Strategy at the Norwegian Business School in Oslo where he works on climate and energy issues, system dynamics, and green growth. Randers was President of the Norwegian Business School/BI 1981-89, and Deputy Director General of WWF International 1994-99. He chaired the Norwegian Commission on a Low-Emission Society which reported in 2006. In 2012, his work 2052 - A Global Forecast for the Next Forty Years was published.] [Subject: Science, Ethics, Environmental Studies]. (shrink)

Chief executive officers (CEOs) engage in activism when they take public stances on sensitive socio-political issues. In this study, we address the less-explored activities that constitute CEO activism beyond single stances as the activism is maintained over time. The data cover 6 years of campaign and media materials from a case company with several CEO-initiated activist campaigns. Our findings from an inductive analysis contribute to CEO activism theorizing in three ways. First, we extend CEO (...) class='Hi'>activism conceptually by identifying five underlying activities that support a public stance: anchoring motivations, modeling action, taking agency, enduring criticism, and normalizing activism. Second, we bridge individual- and organization-level analyses by depicting how a CEO involves a company in activism through activities that justify interrelated topic frame and role frame. Third, we develop a processual model that includes the pre-stance, stance-taking, and post-stance phases and explains how the underlying activities are interrelated and follow a pattern that serves to maintain CEO activism. Accordingly, CEO activism includes activities, through the pre-stance, stance-taking, and post-stance phases, whereby a CEO deliberately engages personally and through a company in public debate about sensitive socio-political issues and the role of businesses in addressing them. (shrink)

UNESCO World Heritage sites are places of outstanding significance and often key sources of information that influence how people interact with the past today. The process of inscription on the UNESCO list is complicated and intersects with political and commercial controversies. But how well are these controversies known to the public? Wikipedia pages on these sites offer a unique dataset for insights into public understanding of heritage controversies. The unique technicity of Wikipedia, with its bot ecosystem and editing mechanics, shapes (...) how knowledge about cultural heritage is constructed and how controversies are negotiated and communicated. In this article, we investigate the patterns of production, consumption, and spatial and temporal distributions of Wikipedia pages for World Heritage cultural sites. We find that Wikipedia provides a distinctive context for investigating how people experience and relate to the past in the present. The agency of participants is highly constrained, but distinctive, behind-the-scenes expressions of cultural heritage activism are evident. Concerns about state-like actors, violence and destruction, deal-making, etc. in the World Heritage inscription process are present, but rare on Wikipedia’s World Heritage pages. Instead, hyper-local and process issues dominate controversies on Wikipedia. We describe how this kind of research, drawing on Big Data and data science methods, contributes to digital heritage studies and also reveals its limitations. (shrink)

In this paper, we document the counter-data action and data activism of a grassroots affordable housing advocacy group in Atlanta. Our observation and insight into these data activities and strategies are achieved through ethnographic and engaged research and participatory design. We find that counter-data action through community-collected data is rooted in a legacy of Atlanta’s black activism and black scholarship; that this data activism enabled resource mobilization and critical conscious making; and (...) that design and media production are essential post counter-data action activities in data activism. Based on these findings, we urge the field of open government data to broaden their concept of social impact of data to include the use data to mobilize resources within oppressed communities not to influence policy and government but to build capacities within community in order to transform, not join, political structures. We also advocate that scholars within the fields of open government data, critical data studies, and data activism recognize the legacy and historic practice of data activism by black communities working towards social change. (shrink)

The term research subject has traditionally been the preferred term in professional guidelines and academic literature to describe a patient or an individual taking part in biomedical research. In recent years, however, there has been a steady shift away from the use of the term 'research subject' in favour of 'research participant' when referring to individuals who take part by providing data to various kinds of biomedical and epidemiological research. This article critically examines this shift, reflecting on the different (...) meanings evoked by the terms 'subject' and 'participant', as well as examining recent examples of patient activism in research. It concludes by suggesting that the wholesale unreflective adoption of the term 'participant' is inappropriate and provides instead a guide on how to determine the circumstances in which the terms subject, participant and activist should legitimately be used. (shrink)

The central topic of this paper is a mobile phone application, ‘InformaCam’, which turns metadata from a surveillance risk into a method for the production of public proof. InformaCam allows one to manage and delete metadata from images and videos in order to diminish surveillance risks related to online tracking. Furthermore, it structures and stores the metadata in such a way that the documentary material becomes better accommodated to evidentiary settings, if needed. In this paper I propose InformaCam should be (...) interpreted as a ‘forensic device’. By using the conceptualization of forensics and work on socio-technical devices the paper discusses how InformaCam, through a range of interventions, rearranges metadata into a technology of evidence. InformaCam explicitly recognizes mobile phones as context aware, uses their sensors, and structures metadata in order to facilitate data analysis after images are captured. Through these modifications it invents a form of ‘sensory data forensics'. By treating data in this particular way, surveillance resistance does more than seeking awareness. It becomes engaged with investigatory practices. Considering the extent by which states conduct metadata surveillance, the project can be seen as a timely response to the unequal distribution of power over data. (shrink)

This article analyses abortion health activism (AHA) in the Irish context. AHA is a form of activism focused on enabling abortion access where it is restricted. Historically, AHA has involved facilitating the movement of abortion seekers along ‘abortion trails’ (Rossiter, 2009). Organisations operate transnationally, enabling access to abortion care across borders. Such AHA is a form of feminist anarchism, resisting prohibitions on abortion through direct action. However, AHA work has changed over time. Existing scholarship relates this to advancements (...) in medical technology, particularly the emergence of telemedicine and the increased use of early medical abortion. This article goes beyond those explanations to explore how else AHA has changed by comparing the work of AHA before and after the Republic of Ireland’s referendum on abortion in May 2018. Based on this, I argue that there is a visible shift in the politics of AHA. Drawing on qualitative data from research on AHA organisations along the Liverpool–Ireland Abortion Corridor, specifically those based outside Ireland, the article argues that in the aftermath of the referendum, Irish AHA has increasingly moved towards decolonising feminist activism, thus drawing attention to the relationship between abortion health activists (AHAs) and broader political discourses entangled with abortion law reform. (shrink)

This article examines the work of internet activist and artist Paolo Cirio, whose practice intersects with matters of copyright, privacy, transparency and corporate finance. His project Loophole for All, for example, exposes the practice of tax evasion in the Cayman Islands by counterfeiting Certificate of Incorporation documents. An important aspect of Cirio’s work is how he names himself in the process. Placed within our contemporary ‘data turn’, his work is framed critically in this article in terms of a ‘new (...) structuralist’ account of culture and society. The article attends to the view that power increasingly comes through the algorithm, but argues that we risk reifying so-called generative rules, which may simply be algorithms out of sight. Cirio’s art practice helps focus on what it means to make a critique of contemporary and ubiquitous algorithm structures. As part of this, the article considers how ‘anonymity’ underlies subversive art practices of the 20th century and contemporary protest groups, but that this anonymity arguably undermines attempts to effect change. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has been a data-political spectacle. Data are omnipresent in prediction and surveillance, and even in resistance to governmental measures. How have citizens, whose lives were suddenly governed by pandemic data, understood and reacted to the pandemic as a data-political phenomenon? Based on a study carried out in Denmark, we show how society became divided into those viewing themselves as supporters of the governmental approach to the COVID-19 pandemic, and those who oppose it. These (...) groups seem to subscribe to very different truths. We argue, however, that both sides share a positivist ideal and think that data and facts ought to rule. Both sides have also come to acknowledge that data are not unambiguous, and both cast increasing doubts on political uses of data. Though the people agreeing with, and the people opposing, the government strategy are in many ways surprisingly similar with respect to epistemic norms, they differ in what they perceive as dangerous or desirable, and in who they believe are telling the “truth” about the pandemic. These different perceptions result in different types of pandemic-related activism. Resistance against restrictions is often understood as inspired by conspiracy theories and in some countries anti-restrictions activism has turned violent. In our case, however, we suggest that when looking at similarities and differences across both groups, the gap between those opposing and those agreeing with the government approach is not as unbridgeable as might be suggested by their beliefs in differing truths and the emerging societal division. (shrink)

Shareholder activism challenges management control over the corporate status quo. Drawing on reactance theory and recent empirical work on corporate political activity and on firms’ response to shareholder activism, and testing using data complied by the Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility, the Federal Election Commission and others for S&P 500 firms from 1999-2006, we find evidence that CPA buffers firms from corporate social responsibility-related or socially-oriented shareholder proposals. Greater CPA, particularly greater relational CPA, influences responses of the (...) U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission as well as responses of the targeted firm, to help neutralize socially-oriented shareholder activism. (shrink)

The activism of institutional investors tends more and more toward the supervision and control of the behavior of the managers of big companies. In this article, we present a model based on the creation of an activism index that lets us evaluate such activism's effect on the sensitivity of the investment policies of a company in the face of financial variables and market variables . To test our assertions, we analyze firm-level data for United Kingdom , (...) Germany, France, Denmark, and Spain during the period 1995-2004. Our results point to a significant reduction in the sensitivity of company investment decisions in the face of these variables, especially relative to intangible capital, as a result of the neutralizing effect of activism on the high agency costs of free cash flow and on the information asymmetries of the market. (shrink)

The popular view of shareholder activism focuses on shareholder resolutions and the shareholder vote via proxy statements at the annual meeting, which is treated as a “David vs. Goliath” showdown between the small group of socially responsible investors and the powerful corporation. This article goes beyond the popular view to examine where the real action typically occurs – in the Dialogue process where corporations and shareholder activist groups mutually agree to ongoing communications to deal with a serious social issue. (...) Use of the capitalized word “Dialogue” is intended to distinguish this formal process between corporations and shareholders from all the other forms of dialogue or two-way communication exchanged between a corporation and its stakeholders. The phenomenon of Dialogue between a corporation and dissident shareholders has not been analyzed in the academic literature or in the popular press because it occurs behind the scenes and out of sight from media scrutiny. Yet this is where a great deal of social change initiated by shareholder activists is negotiated. This article contributes both theoretically and empirically to the study of Dialogues between shareholder activists and corporations. We explain how Dialogues occur in the context of the shareholder resolution process and examine two Dialogues that focus on international labor issues in two industries. Then data on Dialogues during the period, 1999–2005, from the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility are analyzed. This research contributes to knowledge about the Dialogue process and the emerging literature on corporation–stakeholder engagement. (shrink)

How a social science of big data would look like? In this article, we exemplify such a social science through a number of cases. We start our discussion with the epistemic qualities of big data. We point out to the fact that contrary to the big data champions, big data is neither new nor a miracle without any error nor reliable and rigorous as assumed by its cheer leaders. Secondly, we identify three types of big (...) class='Hi'>data: natural big data, artificial big data and human big data. We present and discuss in what ways they are similar and in what other ways they differ. The assumption of a homogenous big data in fact misleads the relevant discussions. Thirdly, we extended 3 Vs of the big data and add veracity with reference to other researchers and violability which is the current author’s proposal. We explain why the trinity of Vs is insufficient to characterize big data. Instead, a quintinity is proposed. Fourthly, we develop an economic analogy to discuss the notions of data production, data consumption, data colonialism, data activism, data revolution, etc. In this context, undertaking a Marxist approach, we explain what we mean by data fetishism. Fifthly, we reflect on the implications of growing up with big data, offering a new research area which is called as developmental psychology of big data. Finally, we sketch data resistance and the newly proposed notion of omniresistance, i.e. resisting anywhere at any occasion against the big brother watching us anywhere and everywhere. (shrink)

This book explores the work of activists in the Americas who are documenting feminicide, arguing that feminist activists at the margins have much to teach mainstream data scientists about data ethics: how to work with data ethically amidst extreme and durable structural inequalities.

This paper draws from critical data studies and related fields to investigate police officer-involved homicide data for Los Angeles County. We frame police officer-involved homicide data as a rhetorical tool that can reify certain assumptions about the world and extend regimes of power. We highlight the possibility that this type of sensitive civic data can be investigated and employed within local communities through creative practice. Community involvement with data can create a countervailing force to powerful (...) dominant narratives and supplement activist projects that hold local officials accountable for their actions. Our analysis examines four Los Angeles County police officer-involved homicide data sets. First, we provide accounts of the semantics, granularity, scale and transparency of this local data. Then, we describe a “counter data action,” an event that invited members of the community to identify the limits and challenges present in police officer-involved homicide data and to propose new methods for deriving meaning from these indicators and statistics. (shrink)

Deep-rooted political turbulence, along with the present hybrid regime, have resulted in an undesirable social, economic and political milieu in Serbia. Such an atmosphere is a fertile ground for a grey economy, corruption, nepotism and restrictions to media freedoms. These?unconventional? means of social functioning, have caused a decline in trust towards state institutions and proportionally, increase of citizen participation in non-institutional models of engagement. The aim of this paper is to analyse one such model of non-institutional engagement: the local activist (...) group Za nas Kej, operating in the area Savski blokovi in New Belgrade. The authors analysed local residents? perception of the activist group Za nas Kej in comparison to the group?s narratives and actions. By using a grounded theory approach authors explained the role of groups such as Za Nas Kej in the development of participatory and deliberative democracy within the local community. Our data indicates that Za nas kej, despite its local character, does not have a strong foothold in the community, and thus receives only passive support. Citizens perceive Za nas kej as mediator between local institutions and residents of the Sava apartment blocks. Despite the failure to mobilise a wider group of citizens for their cause, this activist group continues to be a relevant actor within the local community. (shrink)

Since the start of the new millennium in the UK, a range of new feminist activities – national networks, issue-specific campaigns, local groups, festivals, magazines and blogs – have been formed by a new constituency of mostly younger women and men. These new feminist activities, which we term ‘third-wave’ feminism, have emerged in a ‘post-feminist’ context, in which feminism is considered dead or unnecessary, and where younger feminists, if represented at all, are often dismissed as insufficiently political. Representations of North (...) American third-wave feminism are brought into play in these criticisms of the UK third wave, and insufficient attention has been paid to the distinctiveness of the UK contexts. Drawing on data from a survey of 1265 people involved in post-2000 forms of feminism and semi-structured interviews with thirty feminist activists, the article sketches out the contours of the contemporary feminist movement and its activists, activism and priorities. It attends to differences and similarities between second and third waves, and situates contemporary UK feminism in its distinctive UK context. Arguing that feminism is both alive and relevant for significant numbers of people in the UK today, the article interrogates younger feminists’ reluctance to use the term ‘third-wave feminism’ to describe themselves, attributing this reluctance to ambivalent and cynical representations of the third wave in academic literature and the popular media. (shrink)

: Whilst the recent electoral performance of Parti Islam seMalaysia and Pertubuhan Kebangsaan Melayu Bersatu in Terengganuhas generated much interest, there are lack of studies over the involvementand motivations of the most committed party players; the grassrootsparty activists. PAS and UMNO are strongly supported by committed andextraordinary party members at the grassroots level who devote their time,money, effort, and energy to ensure the party they support wins elections andremains relevant. Unlike other professions, they are working for the party on afull-time (...) basis yet receive no specific income from the party. Their uniquenesshas directed this study to examine the factors which influence them to becomepolitical party activists. This study interviewed thirty-two party activists whowere selected using the purposive sampling technique, and the data was thenthematically analyzed through the content analysis method. Combining theCivic Voluntarism Model and the General Incentives Model into a frameworkto understand factors that motivate informants’ political party activism. Thisstudy discovered five major factors which include the ideology of the party,religious beliefs, defending ethnic supremacy, parental influence, significantpolitical events and educational institutions. This study also academicallydefies the common perception that party activists enjoy material rewards byvirtue of their party activism. (shrink)

This Special Issue provides a collection of cutting-edge research that examines discourses that serve emancipatory agendas by taking a social justice approach. To this end, the issue draws on data from Africa, Latin America, North America and the Arab Levant to illuminate how members of non-dominant and marginalized (disempowered) groups sculpt a positive image for themselves, engage in solidarity formation for group empowerment and reconstruct their experiences in a manner that gives them voice, agency and a positive identity. The (...) issue argues for a more interventionist stance in ideologically oriented discourse analysis and demonstrates why (critical) discourse analysts must not only expose and resist the inequities or injustices in society but, more crucially, also adopt an activist-scholar posture in order to push for positive social change. (shrink)

While explicitly set against a backdrop of sexism in social justice activism more generally, this book exposes causes, pervasiveness, harms, and possible directions for change with regard to sexism and male privilege in the animal activist movement. Employing the work of previous scholars, Dr. Lisa Kemmerer exposes the commonplace nature and causes of sexism and male privilege in social justice activism, then focuses on anymal activists, including new data that has not previously been published. The book also (...) explores the crushing harms caused by sexism in the movement and an extensive array of possible directions for change. In various places throughout the text, Kemmerer refocuses on the interface of sexism and speciesism, and one full chapter explores a philosophies of interconnection from around the world and down through time. Also included are six essays from contributing authors who offer fresh angles on the topic, and who provide contextualized experiences with intersectional oppressions. While the book focuses specifically on animal activism, the end-goal of the book is total liberation—an end to all forms of privilege and marginalization. (shrink)