What difference do data make? Data management and social change

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to expand on emergent data activism literature to draw distinctions between different types of data management practices undertaken by groups of data activists. Design/methodology/approach The authors offer three case studies that illuminate the data management strategies of these groups. Each group discussed in the case studies is devoted to representing a contentious political issue through data, but their data management practices differ in meaningful ways. The project Making Sense produces their own data on pollution in Kosovo. Fatal Encounters collects “missing data” on police homicides in the USA. The Environmental Data Governance Initiative hopes to keep vulnerable US data on climate change and environmental injustices in the public domain. Findings In analysing the three case studies, the authors surface how temporal dimensions, geographic scale and sociotechnical politics influence their differing data management strategies. Originality/value The authors build upon extant literature on data management infrastructure, which primarily discusses how these practices manifest in scientific and institutional research settings, to analyse how data management infrastructure is often crucial to social movements that rely on data to surface political issues.

Introduction to the Data Power Special Issue: tactics, access and shaping

“…Two of the papers in this Special Issue – “Datafication, dataveillance, and the social credit system as China’s new normal” (Lee, 2019) and “What difference does data make? Data management and social change (Currie et al , 2019) – offer unique critiques of power relations through the framework of ‘tactics’”. It is worth engaging in a brief discussion of Michel de Certeau’s (1988) The Practice of Everyday Life here to frame these contributions.…”

“…It must constantly manipulate events in order to turn them into ‘opportunities’” (p. xix). The necessity to constantly evolve one’s tactics is a particularly important consideration for Lee (2019) and Currie et al (2019), who write about the tactics people are adapting during the current climate of fast-paced data-based changes (indeed, at a pace that de Certeau probably did not foresee).…”

“…They examine how Making Sense created a new data set to disclose information about the air quality around Kosovo, an issue that had been concealed by their government; and, how DataRescue – led by the Environmental Data Governance Initiative – archived data created by US federal scientists that documented evidence of climate change and human-induced ecological violence. Literature on data activism typically focuses on generating new data, but the case studies shared by Currie et al (2019) demonstrate how activist groups use missing or already-existing data to highlight contentious political issues. Data management systems are thus a crucial part of political mobilisation for these organisations: without proper management, activist groups would simply be unable to do this work.…”

“…Data management systems are thus a crucial part of political mobilisation for these organisations: without proper management, activist groups would simply be unable to do this work. The authors argue that the results activists produce are only a small part of the work they do: “Behind the visualisations or public-facing databases are a suite of data management infrastructures and organisational norms that form a considerable part of activists’ mundane practice” (Currie et al , 2019, pp. 971-985).…”

“…971-985). As Currie et al (2019) note, data infrastructures are academically under-addressed and yet are integral to “shaping the tactics and political formation of data activists” pp. 971-985).…”