Cornell University

Politechnics: How My Schemes to Build Progressive Technologies Have Not All Failed Yet.

Christopher Csikszentmihalyi, Associate Professor, Information Science, Cornell University

Politically regressive technologies pose a threat to our social fabric as real as contaminants in our food or faulty vehicles on our highways. Yet, with few exceptions, technology "innovators" have little alternative but to reach for the tools and systems of a hegemonic technical culture that would cut this social fabric when convenient, or reinforce its most regressive aspects. Cloud approaches impinge on rights to privacy; gig apps produce insecure jobs -- yet these are the "genres" by which entrepreneurs imagine new products and services. These regressive norms of the ICT community are injected into technologies from school to lab to shelf, from engineering education through research, development, capitalization, business practices, distribution, and marketing. The resulting systems and products covertly forward agendas of disruption, inequality, and obsolescence, rather than justice, solidarity, and cultural growth. To paraphrase Arendt, the sad truth is that most social and economic disruption is done by technologists who never make up their minds to be good or evil.

Christopher Csikszentmihalyi will cover highlights of thirty years as an artist and technologist building atypical systems, both as sociotechnical works in themselves, but also to provide contrast to the regressive systems that surround us. Examples from his labs include protest robots, Civic Media platforms, feminist blenders, and a new project called Repair & Redress. Csikszentmihalyi is Associate Professor in the Faculty of Computing and Information Science at Cornell University. He was the European Research Area Chair in Portugal, leading the Critical Technical Practice lab, and co-founded and directed the MIT Center for Civic Media.

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