Search for: All records

In this paper, we seek to understand how grassroots activists, operating within the hegemony of data-centrism, are often disempowered by data even as they appropriate it towards their own ends. We posit that the shift towards data-driven governance and organizing, by elevating a particular epistemology, can pave over other ways of knowing that are central to social movement practices. Building on Muravyov's [102] concept of ''epistemological ambiguity,'' we demonstrate how data-focused activism requires complex navigations between data-based epistemologies and the heterogeneous, experiential, and relational epistemologies that characterize social movements. Through three case studies (two drawn from existing literature and the third being an original analysis), we provide an analytical model of how generative epistemological refusals can support more value-aligned navigations of epistemological ambiguity that resist data-centrism. Finally, we suggest how these findings can inform pedagogy, research, and technology design to support communities navigating datafied political arenas. 

Why do some peer production projects do a better job at engaging potential contributors than others? We address this question by comparing three Indian language Wikipedias, namely, Malayalam, Marathi, and Kannada. We found that although the three projects share goals, technological infrastructure, and a similar set of challenges, Malayalam Wikipedia’s community engages language speakers in contributing at a much higher rate than the others. Drawing from a grounded theory analysis of interviews with 18 community participants from the three projects, we found that experience with participatory governance and free/open-source software in the Malayalam community supported high engagement of contributors. Counterintuitively, we found that financial resources intended to increase participation in the Marathi and Kannada communities hindered the growth of these communities. Our findings underscore the importance of social and cultural context in the trajectories of peer production communities.