Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - STS and the city
T2 - politics and practices of hope
AU - Coutard, Olivier
AU - Guy, Simon
PY - 2007/11
Y1 - 2007/11
N2 - Many recent studies on network technologies and cities share an alarmist view of the impact of technological or regulatory change in utility sectors on the social and spatial fabric of cities, pointing to growing discrimination and inequalities, alienation, enhanced social exclusion and urban "splintering" on a universal scale.A science and technology study (STS) perspective on these matters is helpful in moving beyond this "universal alarmism" by emphasizing the ambivalence inherent to all technologies, the significant potential of contestation of, and resistance, to technology-supported forms of discrimination, and the deeply contingent nature of the process of appropriation of new technologies and, as a consequence, of the social "effects" of technologies. Adopting this perspective would mean actively searching for and exploring these context-dependent and often conflictive appropriation processes. For it is in these spaces that we might begin to identify urban technological politics that break free from an intellectually and politically disabling technological pessimism.
AB - Many recent studies on network technologies and cities share an alarmist view of the impact of technological or regulatory change in utility sectors on the social and spatial fabric of cities, pointing to growing discrimination and inequalities, alienation, enhanced social exclusion and urban "splintering" on a universal scale.A science and technology study (STS) perspective on these matters is helpful in moving beyond this "universal alarmism" by emphasizing the ambivalence inherent to all technologies, the significant potential of contestation of, and resistance, to technology-supported forms of discrimination, and the deeply contingent nature of the process of appropriation of new technologies and, as a consequence, of the social "effects" of technologies. Adopting this perspective would mean actively searching for and exploring these context-dependent and often conflictive appropriation processes. For it is in these spaces that we might begin to identify urban technological politics that break free from an intellectually and politically disabling technological pessimism.
KW - urban studies
KW - technology studies
KW - infrastructure networks
KW - contingency
KW - politics of hope
KW - CLOSED-CIRCUIT TELEVISION
KW - URBAN
KW - SURVEILLANCE
KW - TECHNOLOGY
KW - SPACE
U2 - 10.1177/0162243907303600
DO - 10.1177/0162243907303600
M3 - Journal article
VL - 32
SP - 713
EP - 734
JO - Science, Technology, and Human Values
JF - Science, Technology, and Human Values
SN - 0162-2439
IS - 6
ER -