Knowledge Agora



Scientific Article details

Title Worth-making in a datafied world: Urban cycling, smart urbanism, and technologies of justification in Santiago de Chile
ID_Doc 42327
Authors Tironi, M; Valderrama, M
Title Worth-making in a datafied world: Urban cycling, smart urbanism, and technologies of justification in Santiago de Chile
Year 2022
Published Information Society, 38, 2
DOI 10.1080/01972243.2022.2027587
Abstract In a milieu marked by increasing quantification of social life, many digital devices have emerged under the promise of a revolutionary change in areas such as urban planning and governance of Smart City projects. Starting from a pragmatist approach based on Boltanski and Thevenot's "orders of worth" framework, we argue that the promoters of digital devices must justify their worth by developing "technologies of justification" that go beyond data. In this article, we use a multi-case study of three digital devices-RUBI, Kappo, and Bikelite-for urban cycling created in Santiago de Chile to analyze the material, narrative, and economic technologies of justification mobilized to establish the worth of the data that these devices extract, analyze, and visualize for urban governance. This comparative analysis helps us problematize the homogeneous, neutral, and efficiency-focused valuations that are typically ascribed to these devices by laying out the wide range of operations that are used to justify and secure the embedding of these digital devices in societies. We conclude by offering a series of analytical clues to what may be a new order of worth, or what we conceptualize as the "datafied world."
Author Keywords Big data; cycling; data-driven urbanism; datafication; datafied world; digital devices; quantification; self-tracking; Smart City
Index Keywords Index Keywords
Document Type Other
Open Access Open Access
Source Social Science Citation Index (SSCI)
EID WOS:000744703000001
WoS Category Communication; Information Science & Library Science
Research Area Communication; Information Science & Library Science
PDF
Similar atricles
Scroll