Books by Mikkel Flyverbom
Papers by Mikkel Flyverbom
Abstract:The ubiquity of digital technologies and the datafication of many domains of social life... more Abstract:The ubiquity of digital technologies and the datafication of many domains of social life
raise important questions about governance. In the emergent field of internet governance
studies, most work has explored novel governance arrangements, institutional developments
and the effects of interactions among public and private actors in the emergence of the internet
as a matter of concern in global politics. But the digital realm involves more subtle forms of
governance and politics that also deserve attention. In this paper, I suggest that the 'ordering'
effects of digital infrastructures also revolve around what I term the ‘management of visibilities’.
Drawing on insights from science and technology studies and sociologies of visibility, the paper
articulates how digital technologies afford and condition ordering through the production of
visibilities and the guidance of attention. The basic tenet of the argument is that there is an
intimate relationship between seeing, knowing and governing, and that digitalisation and
datafication processes fundamentally shape how we make things visible or invisible, knowable
or unknowable and governable or ungovernable. Having articulated this conceptual argument,
the article offers a number of illustrations of such forms of ordering.
Keywords: Internet governance, Science and technology studies (STS), Sociology, Datafication, Visibilities
How do the discourses of participation inform deployment of information and communication technol... more How do the discourses of participation inform deployment of information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D)? Discourses here mean narratives that assign roles to actors, and specify causes and outcomes for events. Based on the theory and practice of international development we identify two dimensions to participation and ICT4D: whether participation 1) is hierarchical/top-down or agent-driven/bottom-up, and 2) involves conflict or cooperation. Based on these dimensions we articulate four ideal types of discourse that permeate ICT and development efforts: stakeholder-based discourses that emphasize consensus, networked efforts among actors collaborating in network arrangements, mobilization discourses that account for contestation over meanings of participation, and oppositional discourses from 'grassroots' actors that also include conflict. We conclude that ICT4D efforts, depending on the context of their implementation, are permeated by multiple discourses about participation. Our four ideal types of participation discourses are, therefore, useful starting points to discuss the intricate dynamics of participation in ICT4D projects.
The claim that big data can revolutionize strategy and governance in the context of international... more The claim that big data can revolutionize strategy and governance in the context of international relations is increasingly hard to ignore. Scholars of international political sociology have mainly discussed this development through the themes of security and surveillance. The aim of this paper is to outline a research agenda that can be used to raise a broader set of sociological and practice-oriented questions about the increasing datafication of international relations and politics. First, it proposes a way of conceptualizing big data that is broad enough to open fruitful investigations into the emerging use of big data in these contexts. This conceptualization includes the identification of three moments contained in any big data practice. Second, it suggests a research agenda built around a set of subthemes that each deserve dedicated scrutiny when studying the interplay between big data and international relations along these moments. Through a combination of these moments and subthemes, the paper suggests a roadmap for an international political sociology of data practices
Page 1. v Contents List of Table and Figures vii Preface viii Notes on Contributors ix 1 Investig... more Page 1. v Contents List of Table and Figures vii Preface viii Notes on Contributors ix 1 Investigating the Disaggregation, Innovation, and Mediation of Authority in Global Politics 1 Hans Krause Hansen Part I The Disaggregation of Authority 2 Disaggregating Authority in Global Governance 27 Tony Porter 3 Governing Regulative Networks Beyond the State 51 Hans Peter Olsen 4 Internet Regulation – Multi-Stakeholder Participation and Authority 72 Mikkel Flyverbom and Sven Bislev Part II The Innovation of Authority ...
The first part of the chapter discusses how digitization, datafication and other developments in ... more The first part of the chapter discusses how digitization, datafication and other developments in the realm of digital technologies underpin societal diagnoses that often conflate a range of distinguishable phenomena, operate at a very high
level of abstraction and distance to the processes they describe. On this backdrop, we argue for the value of a more fine-grained, analytical approach that takes us closer to the operational and practical workings of big data. In particular, more situated and conceptual discussions of the operations and mechanisms at
work may help us grasp some of the novel political, social, and economic conditions resulting from big data without resorting to overly abstract and distant diagnoses. The chapter develops a typology of the social practices and forms of valuation
involved in the production of big data analyses – focusing on the following four moments: Production, Structuring, Distribution & Visualization.
Although transparency is often believed to mitigate the negative effects of power by providing ac... more Although transparency is often believed to mitigate the negative effects of power by providing access to the hidden sides of organizational and political life, extant research fails to specify how transparency more fundamentally relates to power. To make sense of this relationship, this article develops
an analytical language along two dimensions: “observational control” and “regularizing control.” Within this framework, we look at (a) attempts to carry out control through observation, (b) identity-oriented forms of normative control, (c) strategically ambiguous articulations of transparency, and (d) attempts to normalize and institutionalize behavior across organizational settings through the use of reporting and ranking systems. In
the concluding section, we discuss how our conceptualization might nuance and enrich future studies of the transparency–power nexus and we point to some important implications for management practitioners.
Keywords:
transparency, observational control, regularizing control, strategic ambiguity,
power
Mikkel Flyverbom1, Lars Thøger Christensen1,
and Hans Krause Hansen1
Abstract
Although transparency is often believed to mitigate the negative effects of
power by providing access to the hidden sides of organizational and political
life, extant research fails to specify how transparency more fundamentally
relates to power. To make sense of this relationship, this article develops
an analytical language along two dimensions: “observational control” and
“regularizing control.” Within this framework, we look at (a) attempts
to carry out control through observation, (b) identity-oriented forms of
normative control, (c) strategically ambiguous articulations of transparency,
and (d) attempts to normalize and institutionalize behavior across
organizational settings through the use of reporting and ranking systems. In
the concluding section, we discuss how our conceptualization might nuance and enrich future studies of the transparency–power nexus and we point to some important implications for management practitioners.
Keywords:
transparency, observational control, regularizing control, strategic ambiguity,
power
Our special issue on transparency has been published by European Journal of Social Theory - see m... more Our special issue on transparency has been published by European Journal of Social Theory - see more here: http://est.sagepub.com/content/current
Science and Public Policy, Jan 1, 2012
Science Studies-an Interdisciplinary Journal for …, Jan 1, 2007
Transnational private governance and its limits, edited by Jean-Christophe Graz and Andreas Nölke
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Books by Mikkel Flyverbom
Papers by Mikkel Flyverbom
raise important questions about governance. In the emergent field of internet governance
studies, most work has explored novel governance arrangements, institutional developments
and the effects of interactions among public and private actors in the emergence of the internet
as a matter of concern in global politics. But the digital realm involves more subtle forms of
governance and politics that also deserve attention. In this paper, I suggest that the 'ordering'
effects of digital infrastructures also revolve around what I term the ‘management of visibilities’.
Drawing on insights from science and technology studies and sociologies of visibility, the paper
articulates how digital technologies afford and condition ordering through the production of
visibilities and the guidance of attention. The basic tenet of the argument is that there is an
intimate relationship between seeing, knowing and governing, and that digitalisation and
datafication processes fundamentally shape how we make things visible or invisible, knowable
or unknowable and governable or ungovernable. Having articulated this conceptual argument,
the article offers a number of illustrations of such forms of ordering.
Keywords: Internet governance, Science and technology studies (STS), Sociology, Datafication, Visibilities
level of abstraction and distance to the processes they describe. On this backdrop, we argue for the value of a more fine-grained, analytical approach that takes us closer to the operational and practical workings of big data. In particular, more situated and conceptual discussions of the operations and mechanisms at
work may help us grasp some of the novel political, social, and economic conditions resulting from big data without resorting to overly abstract and distant diagnoses. The chapter develops a typology of the social practices and forms of valuation
involved in the production of big data analyses – focusing on the following four moments: Production, Structuring, Distribution & Visualization.
an analytical language along two dimensions: “observational control” and “regularizing control.” Within this framework, we look at (a) attempts to carry out control through observation, (b) identity-oriented forms of normative control, (c) strategically ambiguous articulations of transparency, and (d) attempts to normalize and institutionalize behavior across organizational settings through the use of reporting and ranking systems. In
the concluding section, we discuss how our conceptualization might nuance and enrich future studies of the transparency–power nexus and we point to some important implications for management practitioners.
Keywords:
transparency, observational control, regularizing control, strategic ambiguity,
power
Mikkel Flyverbom1, Lars Thøger Christensen1,
and Hans Krause Hansen1
Abstract
Although transparency is often believed to mitigate the negative effects of
power by providing access to the hidden sides of organizational and political
life, extant research fails to specify how transparency more fundamentally
relates to power. To make sense of this relationship, this article develops
an analytical language along two dimensions: “observational control” and
“regularizing control.” Within this framework, we look at (a) attempts
to carry out control through observation, (b) identity-oriented forms of
normative control, (c) strategically ambiguous articulations of transparency,
and (d) attempts to normalize and institutionalize behavior across
organizational settings through the use of reporting and ranking systems. In
the concluding section, we discuss how our conceptualization might nuance and enrich future studies of the transparency–power nexus and we point to some important implications for management practitioners.
Keywords:
transparency, observational control, regularizing control, strategic ambiguity,
power
raise important questions about governance. In the emergent field of internet governance
studies, most work has explored novel governance arrangements, institutional developments
and the effects of interactions among public and private actors in the emergence of the internet
as a matter of concern in global politics. But the digital realm involves more subtle forms of
governance and politics that also deserve attention. In this paper, I suggest that the 'ordering'
effects of digital infrastructures also revolve around what I term the ‘management of visibilities’.
Drawing on insights from science and technology studies and sociologies of visibility, the paper
articulates how digital technologies afford and condition ordering through the production of
visibilities and the guidance of attention. The basic tenet of the argument is that there is an
intimate relationship between seeing, knowing and governing, and that digitalisation and
datafication processes fundamentally shape how we make things visible or invisible, knowable
or unknowable and governable or ungovernable. Having articulated this conceptual argument,
the article offers a number of illustrations of such forms of ordering.
Keywords: Internet governance, Science and technology studies (STS), Sociology, Datafication, Visibilities
level of abstraction and distance to the processes they describe. On this backdrop, we argue for the value of a more fine-grained, analytical approach that takes us closer to the operational and practical workings of big data. In particular, more situated and conceptual discussions of the operations and mechanisms at
work may help us grasp some of the novel political, social, and economic conditions resulting from big data without resorting to overly abstract and distant diagnoses. The chapter develops a typology of the social practices and forms of valuation
involved in the production of big data analyses – focusing on the following four moments: Production, Structuring, Distribution & Visualization.
an analytical language along two dimensions: “observational control” and “regularizing control.” Within this framework, we look at (a) attempts to carry out control through observation, (b) identity-oriented forms of normative control, (c) strategically ambiguous articulations of transparency, and (d) attempts to normalize and institutionalize behavior across organizational settings through the use of reporting and ranking systems. In
the concluding section, we discuss how our conceptualization might nuance and enrich future studies of the transparency–power nexus and we point to some important implications for management practitioners.
Keywords:
transparency, observational control, regularizing control, strategic ambiguity,
power
Mikkel Flyverbom1, Lars Thøger Christensen1,
and Hans Krause Hansen1
Abstract
Although transparency is often believed to mitigate the negative effects of
power by providing access to the hidden sides of organizational and political
life, extant research fails to specify how transparency more fundamentally
relates to power. To make sense of this relationship, this article develops
an analytical language along two dimensions: “observational control” and
“regularizing control.” Within this framework, we look at (a) attempts
to carry out control through observation, (b) identity-oriented forms of
normative control, (c) strategically ambiguous articulations of transparency,
and (d) attempts to normalize and institutionalize behavior across
organizational settings through the use of reporting and ranking systems. In
the concluding section, we discuss how our conceptualization might nuance and enrich future studies of the transparency–power nexus and we point to some important implications for management practitioners.
Keywords:
transparency, observational control, regularizing control, strategic ambiguity,
power
14-15 May, 2015
In the wake of the Snowden revelations about the surveillance capabilities of intelligence agencies, this interdisciplinary symposium gathers experts to discuss the place and implications of secrecy in contemporary culture and politics.
Thursday 14th May
6.30-8.30
Opening Talk: Jamie Bartlett, Demos, Author of The Dark Net
Respondent, Zach Blas on the ‘Contra-Internet’
Edmond J. Safra Lecture Theatre, The Strand Campus, King’s College London
Free Registation at: https://secretsofdarknet.eventbrite.co.uk/
15 May: Symposium
Free registration at: https://politicsofsecrecy.eventbrite.co.uk/
9-9.15
Introduction: Secrecy’s Frame
Clare Birchall (King’s College London) & Matt Potolsky (University of Utah)
9.15-10.45
Roundtable 1: Between Opacity and Openness
Mark Fenster (College of Law, University of Florida)
(Secrecy and the Hypothetical State Archive)
Zach Blas (Artist, University of Buffalo)
(Informatic Opacity)
Mikkel Flyvverbom (Intercultural Communication and Management, Copenhagen Business School)
(Transparency and the Management of Visibilities)
Vian Bakir (Creative Studies and Media, Bangor University)
(Deceptive Organised Persuasive Communication: (a) Misdirection and (b) Secretly Altering Reality to Fit the Lie you want to Tell)
11.15-12.30
Roundtable 2: Aesthetics of the Secret
John Beck (Institute of Modern & Contemporary Culture, University of Westminster)
(Photography’s Open Secret)
Neal White (Artist, Bournemouth University)
(Secrecy and Art in Practice)
Clare Birchall (American Studies, King’s College London)
(Art “After” Snowden)
12.30-1.30
Lunch
1.30-3.00
Roundtable 3: Open Secrets
Jack Bratich (Communication and Information, Rutgers University)
(Spectacular Secrecy and the Public Secret Sphere: Rumsfeld, Anonymous, and Snowden)
Deme Kasimis (Political Science, Yale University)
(Passing as Open Secrecy: Migrants and the Performance of Citizenship in Classical Greek Thought)
Adam Piette (English, Sheffield University)
(The Open Secret of Nuclear Waste)
Matt Potolsky (English, University of Utah)
(Beyond Fiction: The NSA and Representation)
3.30-4.45
Roundtable 4: Covert Spheres
Timothy Melley (English, Miami University)
(The Democratic Security State: Operating Between Secrecy and Publicity)
Øyvind Vågnes (Visual Culture, University of Copenhagen)
(Drone Warfare and the Language of Precision)
Hugh Urban (Comparative Studies, Ohio State)
(The Silent Brotherhood: Secrecy, Violence, and Surveillance from the Brüder Schweigen to the War on Terror)
5.00-5.30
Summary: Secrecy’s Future