Digitization as politics: Smart farming through the lens of weak and strong data
| Autor: | Michael S. Carolan |
|---|---|
| Rok vydání: | 2022 |
| Předmět: |
Sociology and Political Science
business.industry media_common.quotation_subject 05 social sciences Geography Planning and Development Big data 0211 other engineering and technologies 0507 social and economic geography 021107 urban & regional planning 02 engineering and technology Development Predicate (grammar) Epistemology Through-the-lens metering Politics Optimism Empirical research Sociology business 050703 geography Repurposing Digitization media_common |
| Zdroj: | Journal of Rural Studies. 91:208-216 |
| ISSN: | 0743-0167 |
| Popis: | This paper offers an alternative approach for engaging sociologically, ontologically, and politically with digital farming platforms. A challenge faced by any approach looking to upend intellectual conventions, especially ontological ones, lies in the question of representation, namely, how do we talk about digitization in novel theoretical ways using language rooted in more than two millennia of western human-centered thought? One way to deal with this challenge, the one adopted in this paper, involves decentering familiar terms and repurposing them. Thus, rather than organizing the argument around familiar terms like small and big data, I argue instead that we organize data-assemblages according to what they do, which makes this a political ontological project. To do this, I offer the relational predicate of weak data and strong data, suggesting that they are good to think with in this regard. The argument ultimately lands at a place for analyzing these platforms that offers the potential for critique and perhaps even a degree of optimism, as I suggest a framework for normatively evaluating these practices. The paper draws upon various empirical studies of digital agriculture conducted by the author, which include interviews with farmers, farm laborers, hacktivists, investors, and engineers from numerous countries and locales. |
| Databáze: | OpenAIRE |
| Externí odkaz: |
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